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Double transit on Jupiter last night ?

spaceboy

By spaceboy
in Observing - Planetary

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spaceboy

spaceboy

Posted
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Hi All

Was there a double transit last night while the GRS sat central ??? My first time out with an 80mm f/6 so I was surprised I was able to pick out the GRS if I'm honest but I was sure there were also two shadows transiting before the moons passed.

Thanks

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Fatrick

Fatrick

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I was out with Jupiter for an hour last night too at around 9pm. GRS was indeed in the middle of the planet (glad someone else confirmed that, that's made me very pleased to have seen that for the 1st time) but no shadow transits that I seen. Couldn't get a decent focus on it at all, tho the strong winds were possibly not helping with that :)

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chiltonstar

chiltonstar

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There was a double transit later on last night which I watched, but it was of the Galilean moons themselves, not the shadows. Excellent seeing -  I managed to spot both for 30 minutes or so before I moved on to Zeta CNC and then Mars...

Chris

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davedownsouth

davedownsouth

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Just found this http://www.cloudynights.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/6425889/Main/6422468

Must have been floaters in my eye :( Still chuffed to have seen the GRS with a 3" scope, although I'm thinking that's due to the favourable position of Jupiter at the moment??

Impressive, I was pleased to see the red spot through my 8" last night, and without a UHC filter I found it really difficult to pick out.  This was at 8:20ish and the seeing conditions were pretty good.

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spaceboy

spaceboy

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Using Stellarium roll back the time to yesterday and zoom right in and take a peek.

I think some adjustments have to be made deeper in Stellarium to give more accuracy for these sorts of things.....position of GRS, moons etc. There was a thread on here some years ago that walked you through the process but it was a while ago and I never made a note of what to do at the time :( Saying that there have been several versions of Stellarium released from then so if this was addressed I can't say.

hi Nick

I saw two dark grey festoons from memory (about when the GRS was central) so maybe these are what you saw? e.g. http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/212041-jupiter-23rd-march/

Thanks Shane. I had wondered if it might be barges or something as I remember a couple years ago several appeared on the surface but TBH I would have thought seeing such detail would be beyond such a small scope and with the moons near by it seemed like the most logical explanation. I can only assume it just goes to show an experience eye really does pay in this hobby :D

There was one at around 2.15am, which I was looking forward to until I realised Jupiter would be so low by then.

ga4uru6e.jpg

Stu

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I was fast asleep by that time Stu.

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ArmyAirForce

ArmyAirForce

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The Moons on Stellarium are pretty accurate from what I've photographed, the the Great Red Spot is not a fixed location, and does drift, so its position is only accurate at the time that version of Stellarium is released ( assuming they add the correction with each new release ). The position can be changed, but the tutorial here didn't work for me until I found another version of the file, not in the Stellarium folder, but in my 'User' folder on my laptop. So it can be changed, but it is just as easy to check the bottom of the Sky & Telescope page here - http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/objects/planets/3304091.html?page=1&c=y

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Paul M

Paul M

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I watched the GRS on Sunday night and I was certain that I saw a shadow transit of Ganymede around midnight too.

But looking here: http://www.projectpluto.com/jevent.htm

The timings imply it was the transit of Io itself that I was watching.

That would be a first for me. But it seemed too dark. I was (am!) sure it was a shadow.

I didn't take any notes with times etc so it's already lost in the fog of time!

I turned away from Jupiter just as Ganymede began its transit. 

EDIT: Reading the links again it looks like it was Io's shadow in transit which was followed later by Ganymede's shadow.

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entropia

entropia

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I haven't seen Jupiter in a while but since yesterday was clear (and I read about the double transit) I decided to take a look. I couldn't see it since it has already passed but I saw 6 moons so I thought my telescope needed collimation. It took me some seconds to realize there were 2 stars that were in the same plane. 

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spaceboy

spaceboy

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I have had a look on the net for clear images of Jupiter around the same time the GRS was central to see if I can pick out what it was I saw before my memory fades. I'm pretty sure I picked something out as I am used to floaters getting in the way so I'm almost sure it wasn't them.

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spaceboy

spaceboy

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I have got an image of the net where the GRS was just to mark where I saw dark patches. The larger being where I thought the shadows of the moon were as these stood out and smaller ones that happened to also grasp my attention. The moons themselves were as previously posted by armyairforce. 

While the evidence stands against a double transit I am still intreaged to find out what they were be it barges, festoons or my imagination. 

post-8355-0-41148400-1395770179.jpg

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Reeny

Reeny

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There was a double transit due that night.

I was going to observe it myself, but it was cloudy here.

According to Stellarium, there was going to be one shadow passing over.

Then just as that one was about to clear, another moon shadow was going to appear.

More like two singles one after the other than a double.

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Paul M

Paul M

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I just downloaded the newly released SkySafari 4 Pro on my android tablet ( already had the previous Pro installed) and while tinkering realised that it renders shadow transits very well. 

So did my previous Pro version but I never realised !

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Stu

Stu

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I just downloaded the newly released SkySafari 4 Pro on my android tablet ( already had the previous Pro installed) and while tinkering realised that it renders shadow transits very well.

So did my previous Pro version but I never realised !

Thanks for that Paul. I did exactly the same earlier, upgrading from Plus and didn't know it showed shadow transits. It's a really great app :-).

Cheers,

Stu

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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Dreamweaver

Dreamweaver

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I took my 90mm skywatcher Mak to Ghana as a light weight travel scope. Excellent. Using a celestron 24 - 8mm zoom I saw a clear, tiny sharp black dot on Jupiter which I concluded was the shadow of IO. It was towards the top right corner of Jupiter between 1 and 2 o'clock position. I thought I could see another black dot towards the center but I was not sure.  This was around midnight on Tuesday the 25th. Three moons could be seen and the angle of IO seemed to coincide with the sharp shadow but I'm not sure about the other one near the center.

I think I could make out the GRS too, only very faint. This was observed from Elmina, which is on the south west coast of Ghana near to Cape Coast from hotel grounds that had quite annoying lighting. None the less a fantastic thrill to see a Jovian transit for the first time! 

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