Best seeing conditions for a long time

[Matt Scunthorpe]

Considering it was bonfire night and fireworks were clouding up the air, it has to of been the best conditions ive been under for a long time.

It was the astro club night (North lincs astro) so got out early on, around 7.15.

Obviously my first target was Jupiter, it was still fairly low so i left it for a little while. Looking at M45, stunning as ever, and doesnt even fit in the 25mm properly, a good 32mm might do that job.

Next up was M31 , I’m sure I could just make out some of the dust lanes, but my eyes could of been playing tricks on me as i know they are there, the core was nice and bright. M57 looked good, even with the 9mm it kept stable, suprising by how much smoke there was in the air at this point.

Looking back now, i wish id of looked at M13 again as its getting low early now, and its one of my favourite things. Waited out for M42 while at the club, could see the Trapezium but nothing spectactualar as it was so low.

I got home after the club, and just had to set up again giving the conditions, first up was M52. Now I’d never found this before, and used the Telrad for the first time productively. Can happily say I found it as well, trouble i find with Open Clusters is realising waht you are going to see, obviously a cluster, but there so small it can be tricky to find them.

i tried to find M1 using the telrad, but on two different Telrad maps i had, they were showing different positions, and one of them agreed with the Stellarium Telrad position. Anyone have any decent maps they know about that seem reliable?

Now Orion was higher in the sky I had a better look at M42 , could see it beautifully clear, and after a little bit of research on M43, I could see the star that illuminates the Nebula, but no nebulosity itself. I couldn’t finish the evening without another look at Jupiter and its 4 moons in a nice line.

All in all, was outside from about 19.15-22.00 then 23.00-00.30.

[Double Kick Drum]

That's a nice haul of objects.

Agree with your note about smoke and the fact that it seems to attract moisture. I had the scope cooling dowm but aborted due to the sky getting a bit scuzzy and the fact that there were a few clouds dotted about.

Thanks for sharing!

[Alastair Rae]

Sky did look good last night but I was too busy letting off fireworks and grilling sausages to get the scope out! I'm sure firework smoke wouldn't affect the seeing too much.

[KevUU]

Sounds like a great night, you lucky lucky man

Thanks for the report!