GazOC

Could the mirror be from one of those Newts that uses a focal reducer system near the focuser to get an optically shorter scope out of a long focal ratio spherical mirror? That way they reduce the aberations in the relatively easy to make mirror and still have a manageable sized scope.

Looks like a con. Contact only via Email and all that.

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/acuter/acuter-spotting-scopes.html Just wondering if anyone has any experience of this scope for astro work. I'm going to the Dominican Republic in a few weeks and would like to take a grab and go set up for a bit of casual observing while I'm out there. At the moment I own a 80mm Equinox which, with a decent tripod, would eat into my baggage weight allowance a little too much or a pair of 15x70 binos so was wondering whether a 100mm Acuter on a camera tripod may be a better option? Thanks in advance.

Thank you for introducing me into astronomy. RIP.

Gary!!! Thank God someone else has seen something similar!! Jam: It seemed pretty uniform in speed, certainly until it went off on the angle. It wasn't a really fast meteor, same sort of speed as the fireballs that seem to move a little slower than most meteors. Too fast for a sattelite though and didn't make any noise to be a low flying aircraft. AAF: Thats some contrail! Thanks for the input and theories guys. I didn't want to come across as a UFO nut (or a Santa nut for that matter!)

Found this; http://www.weatherfriend.com/astronomy/meteor/geminids/geminids.html "Did some meteors change direction in flight? I have seen the Leonid and Geminid meteor showers for several years. During this time, myself and fellow HAS members have seen a few Geminids that change direction in mid-flight."

Yep BH, I'd not thought of that. Def. a possibility.

Cheers Ant, I was taking a quick break from observing and followed it right the way across its flight, it wasn't a "corner of the eye" view. One thing I'm trying to figure out is, does a 90 degree change in direction from my point of view actually mean the meteor had to have moved the same angle in flight? Or could it have been a shallower angle that seemed 90 degrees to me because i had no way of accurately judging the distance and/ or speed change when the object was defelected? Either that or space aliens/ Santa it would seem...I don't believe in either though.

I didn't see anything like that LJ but one theory seems to be the meteor hitting the Earths atmosphere at a shallow angle and skimming off. It did look very impressive.

About 23:20 a meteor started off near Gemini, moved across the sky East to West until low in the sky near Andromeda and then abruptly just pinged off 90 degrees and went North towards where Cygnus was setting near the horizon. I'd never seen anything this before though a bit of Googling throws up that this phenomenon has been observed before. Just wondered if anyone else had seen this tonight, it was very striking?

I'll take that bet DarkStar. My side of the bet is opened ended, your best possible outcome is not to lose.

Seconded. It ticks every box really.

Superb.

Crater Clavius Crater Copernicus

Correct Ant.