Paul M

Wow! Was your visit planned for full Moon or was it just chance..

I had a similar experience when I was a boy with my 60mm refractor and the dreaded "solar filter" that was something like a bit of welders mask screwed in the back of the eyepiece (yeah, I know, I know.. ) I'm not sure how the injury came about, the filter didn't fail nor did it have any defects, but the "dazzled" sensation in my right eye only improved slightly over the next few days and since then I've had a blind spot in the center of vision. My brain has long since learned to ignore it and fill in with my left eye. But that wasn't always the case, begin right eye dominant. The damage is very minimal physically and only one optometrist has noticed it during routine eye exams while examining my retinas. Never since have I aligned my eyes with a sun/telescope combination. I don't doubt that there are a number of absolutely safe methods but I'll look at the excellent images here on SGL if I want to know what's happening on the Sun!

Just checking out a favorite webcam of mine, the harbour area of Marmaris, Turkey and see a local stargazer setting up his scope for public viewing. I've met him a few times back in the day, when we used to visit every year. Unfortunately not been back since starting fostering (cost and time constraints) but it's a lovely spot in the evenings but very brightly lit. Moon and planets only! http://www.marmaris.bel.tr/canli-yayin?player=cl Edit: my link doesn't select the right camera so you'll have to select "Kordon".

It seems that the new Starlink constellation is now well spread round its orbit: https://www.heavens-above.com/StarLink.aspx.

I dropped off a non-astro forum in February. A community I'd been a member of for 12 or more years. It wasn't really a conscious decision. Work and fostering fills my time and I just got out of the habit of logging in. Maybe I'll look in some time in the future but probably won't now. There are some periods when I don't get to SGL for a while but it's a nice place to come and relax, thanks to the fine moderation of the group

The big problem with a perfect night sky in June is that you can see how light the sky remains all night long! Ok, not a terminal problem for planetary, lunar and stellar observations but even then it's a narrow window of usable darkness.

Excellent find. I looked at the app yesterday (pro version) to see if it was on the front page, never thought about searching. Got it now, thanks. Just need a weather opening!

I only really knew of him through his appearance in Feynman's timeline but I recdntly watched a few YouTube offerings of him in interviews (including his thoughts on Feynman!) and he came across as great character too. Another great loss for the classic era of modern physics.

And more and more children being exposed to the cancer that is social media.

It seems bizarre that Mr. Musk got the go-ahead for this project. I imagine that for 99.999999% of the world's population internet connectivity is more important than having sight of the night sky. Think of all that extra space junk to track and avoid, particularly for manned space flight.

That's a great capture. Got stiff neck watching it! I missed the launch and I've only seen a limited amount of coverage since. One thing that struck me is the high orbital inclination, obviously to increase the extent of coverage of the new network. Anyway, is the second stage still sowing its seeds or has it re-entered now?

As is often the case, a thread here on SGL started me on a train of thought... A discussion about a tour to this year's Total Eclipse in South America got me thinking about the next deep solar eclipse as seen from home. I knew there was one in the next decade and researched it here (an excellent resource): http://xjubier.free.fr/en/site_pages/solar_eclipses/TSE_2026_GoogleMapFull.html?Lat=54.73640&Lng=-2.75216&Zoom=8&LC=1 On 12th August 2026 a deep eclipse will be visible before sunset. I further investigated my local circumstances with Stellarium and got to thinking about making a script to showcase the view from my location. I know nothing about scripting so looked at the scripts that come packaged with Stellarium to see if they made sense. Some of the script was self explanatory, some less so. The scripting editor within Stellarium can be accessed by pressing F12 . Given a lack of Stellarium scripts I see being proffered on SGL I'm thinking it's not a popular pastime but it's something I've been threatening to have a go at for some time. I decided that re-engineering an existing script would be the best bet and chose solar_eclipse.ssc written by Matthew Gates, who deserves full credit for my limited success! I changed the stuff I could work out and also borrowed some lines from a number of Alex Wolf's scripts (as included with Stellarium). My method wasn't pretty! I hacked and hacked and cut and pasted and ran my script a million times (when it would run). It was rather like pouring a bucket of amino acids in a pond and waiting for an ape to emerge There is a guide: https://stellarium.org/doc/0.19/scripting.html , which maybe makes much sense to experienced coders but it's very, very hard going for my poor old brain. Anyway, after some hours I got what I was looking for and I'm pleased with the result...so far. I decided it would be nice to make a video of it but to do so I had to employ a Google Chrome plug-in that uploads video captures to my Google Drive (the XBox video capture feature in W10 requires hardware that my computer doesn't have). I don't have a YouTube channel and don't want to start one. So, here is the world premier of my Stellarium Script. It won't hot-link so it's hopefully a clickable link. Let me know if it doesn't work!! https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YH53mSRVxluV4iACKElftIFMcqEaVQny/view?usp=sharing

The downtime flew by. I used it to chat with the wife. She seems quite nice.... 😁

I tuned in just in time to watch that launch. Unfortunately it got scrubbed at about T-12 due to issues with the drone ship off shore.

Sticking with the specifics of telephone apps, it's my understanding that the Stellarium Android app (don't know about iOS) is separate from the Windows Stellarium package. The development of the app was taken over a long time ago by other persons and it evolved separately. I'm not sure if it even exists on Android now but last time I tried it it was a shadow of the Windows version.

I think Sky Safari is now the definitive app for Android devices. Had it for years and use it frequently. I've used Heavens Above Pro app for some time too but its origin is as a satellite/event prediction and mapping tool and that's what it's best at. Also on my Android devices I currently have: Satellite Safari - rarely used, ISS onLive - ocassional use and ISS Detector - handy tool for a quick look at what's up tonight, quite like it.

What we need is an all electric launch vehicle. Rocket fuel seems so primitive

"Nominal" seems to underplays success in the same way that "anomaly" underplays disaster; as in the Crew Dragon suffering an "anomaly" during test firing on the ground on Friday: Space X won't confirm the severity of the incident but all reports are of catastrophic failure The next flight was going to be manned I think.

Not been too much in the press about the Israeli moon shot. I was watching the live feed of the landing attempt this evening and saw dreams shattered. The lander suffered a few glitches on the deorbiting and final engine burn. They lost telemetry at one point and the main descent engine failed just a few hundred metres from touch down. They rebooted the spacecraft but it looks like the main engine returned to service about the same time as impact. They announced it as a total loss almost immediaimmediately The engine was British built. The inquest will be.interesting. Did the engine fail or was it let down by spacecraft systems?

Congratulations on owning a Fullerscope! I still have my 6in Newtonian that I bought new in the early 80's. They aren't like the glitzy mass produced modern scopes. The A grade mirrors are excellent but the lower grade mirrors won't discernibly inferior to a less experienced user. Looking forward to seeing some photos of it.

Here's an interactive mapping tool of that eclipse for devout eclipse chasers : http://xjubier.free.fr/en/site_pages/solar_eclipses/TSE_2020_GoogleMapFull.html?Lat=-40.11519&Lng=-76.34272&Zoom=5&LC=1 It gives information on the circumstances for any point you click on the map. I don't think I'll be travelling to South America for that one! Here is the index of of other events: http://xjubier.free.fr/en/site_pages/SolarEclipsesGoogleMaps.html

This BBC news article is a good overview : https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-46742298 It suggests that the two lobes probably came together during the formation of the solar system. I guess the only change has been painfully slow sublimation and irradiation of the surface. Nothing much happens out there in the Kupier belt, at least not until some maniac drives through the neighbourhood at 17km/s

Just now, a belated birthday present. A big box of espresso coffee pads for my Senseo coffee maker. Not exactly astro but if you drink enough you will start seeing stars.

Thanks, It was a present from the MD. Seemingly she thought it was going to be another "oh thanks...." present, heading straight for a cupboard. She's delighted that: a) I posted about it here. b) It's a popular item. I've also received 2 bottles of Gin, un wrapped in advance but still unopened!) So on return from our Tenerife trip perhaps I'll be enjoying the odd evening of double moon globes!

The posty bought me an early birthday present (we'll be away on the day): an illuminated Moon globe. It has a remote and can change colour etc. Quite effective in a dark room