Delayed gratification for achievement in astronomy

I recently received a certificate and pin acknowledging my completion of the Astronomical League Urban Observing Program. The Astronomical League is an umbrella organization supporting local astronomy clubs and promoting astronomy outreach and education. It has more than 70 different observing programs that create challenges and add structure for amateur astronomers in their observations.

I got interested in the programs after seeing a presentation about them by former Seattle Astronomical Society member Burley Packwood, who has completed a dozen or more of the programs and really touted their value for getting observers out under the stars and not just looking at the same old things.

I decided to give it a try and picked the Urban Observing Program for obvious reasons. I do the vast majority of my observing in the backyard of Seattle Astronomy headquarters in West Seattle, Washington, where it's not only cloudy all the time but also meets the program's requirement that observations be made from light-polluted skies, defined in this case as "any skies where you cannot see the Milky Way with the unaided eye."

The program has a list of one hundred celestial objects that can be spotted from places like West Seattle, though many of them are extremely difficult. Galaxies in particular are challenging. It's often tough to tease out M31, the Andromeda Galaxy, much less some of the smaller, fainter fuzzies. In my observing notes I often referred to my target object as "just a smudge," and often went back out the next night to try to see it again and confirm that the smudge wasn't just where a mosquito sneezed on the optics!

The observing was fun even though, and maybe even because, it was challenging. I completed the observations what I perceived to be a few years ago, but never got around to organizing the observing notes that the paperwork for the program award. Then a few weeks ago the new issue of Reflector, the Astronomical League's magazine, arrived in my mailbox. It made me think that getting that stuff submitted would be a nice little social distancing project. Turns out I made that last of the one hundred observations BACK IN 2011! The first came in 2006, so I spent 14 years on the project, the last nine of which were completely inactive. If there was a certificate for procrastination, I might be in the running.

I had to drop Packwood a note about my achievement. He responded that he is the point person with the Astronomical League for the Sonora Astronomical Society in Green Valley, Arizona where he now lives. He noted that he still has "a lot of respect for those programs" and that he "always learned something when I worked my way through an award."

Packwood, by the way, is a talented astrophotographer who was recently featured in this article from the Green Valley News.

Get out there and look at the stars. You could win a major award!

Optimism in amateur astronomy

I am an optimist by nature, but this sunny disposition is often greatly challenged by one of my chosen hobbies in amateur astronomy. There's a lot that can happen to foil your best laid plans for a night of observing, especially when you live in a major urban center with a marine climate that is hell-bent on throwing clouds your way about 98 percent of the time.

Perhaps that last statement wasn't entirely optimistic. Yet I enjoyed a couple of clear nights of observing on Monday and Tuesday this week, and with a good weather forecast for Wednesday I set out to improve my views of Mars for that evening's session.

This involved a trek out to Ballard for a visit to Cloud Break Optics, where proprietor Stephanie Anderson was able to set me up with a set of planetary filters that could well improve my observations of Mars.

My new set of planetary filters.

I have not been much of a filter user in my astronomical observations. Up until this week I only owned one filter, a 13-percent Moon filter that tones down the light reflected by Luna. Without it, viewing the Moon through a telescope can be downright uncomfortable. Still, I'm always willing to try new things, and Stephanie set me up with a Mars Observing Kit made by Celestron. The kit included four filters: an #80A blue filter that can enhance views of surface features and polar ice caps; a #56 green filter that improves contrast for polar caps, low clouds, and dust storms; a #25 red filter can darken the seas on Mars while lightening its orange deserts; and a special Mars filter that combines the features of the red and blue filters. It also included a Barlow lens that doubles the magnification of any eyepiece you use in observing. I already had one of those, but will soon hold a competition to find out which is better.

The weather held as predicted on Wednesday, though as I made my way home from Cloud Break Optics I noticed some ominous clouds off to the west and, in another example of shaken optimism, immediately recalled the old adage that buying new astronomy gear means bad weather for weeks. It's sort of like rain being caused by washing your car. I am occasionally chided for passing along "weather superstitions" (most recently when I blamed my putting up the lights on our deck umbrella for causing rain). Some say they're not useful or helpful. Nevertheless, I think they're true.

I gave my new filters a test and could tell right away they worked. The glare of a super-bright Mars was greatly reduced, making more detail visible. It was a little strange looking at green, hot pink, blue, or purple Mars after years of seeing the unfiltered orange/red version, but I'll get used to that soon enough. The bad news was that while the details of Mars became a bit more prominent, it was difficult to really make them out because even though the sky was clear the viewing conditions were atrocious. The seeing, though not as poor as it was Monday, wasn't great. The transparency was truly awful because of high moisture in the atmosphere. So while I could see a bit more detail on Mars, I had a decidedly muddy view of what the details actually might be. The moisture was bad enough that pretty early on in my viewing session my optics, including my new filters, collected a heavy layer of dew that brought my work for the night to an end.

I remain undaunted. As I write this in the early afternoon on Friday, the sky is mostly clear, with a little haze off to the west. As an optimist, my telescope is still by the back door, not down in the corner of the basement where it sits for months waiting for the clouds to clear. I'm planning another shot at Mars for tonight.

Another look at Mars

Being blessed at Seattle Astronomy headquarters with the rare-for-December occurrence of consecutive clear evenings, I ventured out again last night with the telescope to see what could be seen.

My prime objective was Mars. Seeing and transparency were somewhat better than there were on Monday evening. While the view of Mars through the telescope was much more stable, there was again very little detail to be seen. I've come to the harebrained conclusion that Mars may simply be too bright! This is seldom noted as a problem in astronomy. Usually things such as galaxies and nebulae are too faint to be seen, especially in a city where light  pollution is an obstacle. I have, however, noticed with other planets such as Jupiter that the best views may be in twilight when the contrast between the object being looked at and the sky is not so great.

The Moon from Seattle Astronomy
headquarters on Dec. 1, 2020.
 Photo: Greg Scheiderer.

I may be in touch with our friends at Cloud Break Optics to see if they can set me up with a Mars filter, STAT. The forecast for tonight is another clear one.

There was better luck with the Moon, which being a couple of days past full was still pretty big but clearly on the waning side. I managed to capture a nice (by my standards) photo of the Moon using a handheld iPhone camera. I always have trouble finding the exit pupil with the smallish lens of the phone cam, but got a decent one after a few tries this time. I always use a disclaimer that I'm not really an astrophotographer, but do like to grab the occasional snapshot, just to prove I was there!

I'll be out again tonight if the weather forecast proves true!

Mars glistens; Jupiter-Saturn conjunction approaches

Not the view through my telescope!
This image of Mars was captured by
the Hubble Space Telescope in 2018.
 (Credit NASA, ESA, and STScI)

It was a nice, clear night last night and I dragged the telescope out of the basement for a look at how Mars was coming along. The answer: swimmingly! That is to say, neither the seeing nor the transparency were very good despite the "clear" sky. One look at the nearly full Moon revealed that there was plenty of moisture in the air, as its orb was surrounded by a rainbow halo of light. 

Thus my views of Mars from last night were mostly on the wobbly side. In the occasional moment of steady seeing I was able to spot the Red Planet's southern polar cap, but couldn't catch much else in the way of surface features.

This is not to say that the views of Mars were bad. Though we're nearly two months past its closest approach to Earth for this particular apparition, Mars is still bright red and it's quite high in the evening sky. Maybe the view was even better without a telescope! Our forecast in Seattle is for another clear evening today, and I plan to give Mars another look.

Another sky spectacle is approaching. Jupiter and Saturn have been hanging out together for much of the year, and they've pulled noticeably closer together in recent weeks. The two are headed for a great conjunction on Dec. 21, 2020, when they will appear less than one degree apart in the western sky! In fact, they'll be within six one-hundredths of a degree at their closest and will appear as one bright object! For reference, the full Moon appears about half a degree wide.

This article from Sky at Night magazine explains the conjunction, which will be the closest of our solar system's two largest planets in about 400 years! Fingers crossed for clear skies that night!