Whats been your most dissapointing astronomical moment?

[Nostromo]

Setting up a 25inch Dob with John Hall at Kelling Heath in April (I think it was 2003) and then suddenly realising it was snowing. It didn't stop either and we got a couple of feet that night, but the skies were clear a bit before - wierd. Anyway we packed it up reasonably quick, but very dissapointing. I had seen such cool stuff through that scope, it really was like looking at photos. I wonder who has it now? It's still in the UK but John sold it ages ago.

Nick

[Astronut]

Travelling all the way to the big island of Hawaii in 1991 to see the longest solar eclipse of the 20th century and then being clouded out.

Then, after travelling much too far in a yellow school bus to the centre line, being told that those who stayed at the hotel saw it through thin clouds .

All made worse because I only went because seeing an eclipse was on my bucket list.

However, it was all made better in 1994 when I went to Chile and saw the eclipse in the high Andes

--

Martyn.

Of all the places in the world, I would have expected Hawaii to be near the bottom of the list of locations with 'high risk of cloud cover'. You must have been gutted to say the least.

[661-pete]

For me - 11th August 1999 too! We were staked out in Compiègne France but didn't fare any better :crybaby:. Folks a few tens of kilometres east of us, in front of Reims cathedral, saw totality, so I was told. And a lot closer to where we were, just to taunt us: about twenty minutes before totality, we could see sunlight glinting on the windscreens in a car park about 2 Km east of where we stood. We started to walk towards it - but knew we wouldn't make it in time - and at least I had the satisfaction of seeing the sunlight glints disappear a few minutes later!

Another much earlier occasion for me was the total eclipse of 1961 (total in France and Italy) of which I was hoping to see the partial phase from England. It would have been the first partial I'd have witnessed (I've seen plenty since!) - but once again it was and I had to go blubbering to school having seen nothing.

Another disappointment for me was Halley's comet in 1985/86. I never saw it naked-eye, though I could find it in binoculars. By that time light pollution had taken hold and I was finding it difficult to get to a good site. At least Hale-Bopp eleven years later made up for it!

Another famous comet 'disappointment' (for nearly everyone - not just me) was Kohoutek in the 1970s. I was up before dawn on a freezing November morning looking for it - without success. But I got a superb view of Mercury to make up for it - the best sighting I've ever had!

[Lady Isabella]

Travelling all the way to the big island of Hawaii in 1991 to see the longest solar eclipse of the 20th century and then being clouded out.

Then, after travelling much too far in a yellow school bus to the centre line, being told that those who stayed at the hotel saw it through thin clouds .

All made worse because I only went because seeing an eclipse was on my bucket list.

However, it was all made better in 1994 when I went to Chile and saw the eclipse in the high Andes :occasion7: :occasion9:

--

Martyn.

Someone I know, also went to Hawaii to view this eclipse, and yes they were also clouded out.

[thing]

M31 for me too. Suprising how many folk feel let down by this one! I'd spent years seeing it through binos and when I got my Newt it was the first thing I swung to. Just the same smudge only brighter. I still think it looks better through my 8x30's. Neptune was totally underwhelming too. I know I must have seen it because my GOTO was spot on and it was in the right pattern of stars but it just looked like......another star. No colour at all.

[Helen]

For me - 11th August 1999 too! We were staked out in Compiègne France but didn't fare any better :crybaby:. Folks a few tens of kilometres east of us, in front of Reims cathedral, saw totality, so I was told. And a lot closer to where we were, just to taunt us: about twenty minutes before totality, we could see sunlight glinting on the windscreens in a car park about 2 Km east of where we stood.

Just to rub it in....it might have been our car....we just drove until we got clear sky...and it was awesome!

I agree about Halley's smudge though!

Helen

[661-pete]

My wife took a photo of the moon once and said that she hoped it would come out OK because she had used a flash.

I jest not ... there have been times when, frustrated in my attempts to find my target for a Deep Sky imaging session, I have been known to flash my torch up at the relevant bit of sky in exasperation hoping to pierce the gloom... :oops:

[661-pete]

Perhaps to redress the balance (and so as not to put off any newbies browsing this thread!) - we should post our astro success stories as well? Some good comet moments to make up for the duds (1997 Hale Bopp and Hyakutake of course - and Holmes last year). Also I had a good sighting of Bennett way back in 1970 - and Arend-Roland in 1957 though I was too young to remember that one!

And there was the the 2004 Venus transit. After all the hype, and the 1999 fiasco, I was so sure it was going to be clouded-out, I was prepared to lay money on it. But I was proved wrong - a glorious sunny day (as indeed it was for most of Britain I believe)!

[Mark at Beaufort]

Like many astronomers I was frustrated by missing totality in Cornwall in 1999. However, I went to Side, Turkey for the total eclipse in 2006 and had wonderful clear skies. My disappointment was taking numerous photos with a remote control switch whilst viewing with the unaided eye only to realise near the end of the eclipse that I had left the solar filter on the scope!!!

Mark

[Tiny]

Perhaps to redress the balance (and so as not to put off any newbies browsing this thread!) - we should post our astro success stories as well? Some good comet moments to make up for the duds (1997 Hale Bopp and Hyakutake of course - and Holmes last year). Also I had a good sighting of Bennett way back in 1970 - and Arend-Roland in 1957 though I was too young to remember that one!

And there was the the 2004 Venus transit. After all the hype, and the 1999 fiasco, I was so sure it was going to be clouded-out, I was prepared to lay money on it. But I was proved wrong - a glorious sunny day (as indeed it was for most of Britain I believe)!

Now that was one of our highlights. We watched it from our boat moored near Chelmondeston lock, Middlewich branch, Shropshire Union canal. Our tools were a pair of bins and a bit of white paper to focus the disc across which the black dot moved.

Of course Venus transits are famous for men sailing round the world to see them and being stopped by War, Clouds etc. so it was nice to be seeing it 3 miles from Nantwich, England on a boat!

[661-pete]

Our tools were a pair of bins and a bit of white paper to focus the disc across which the black dot moved.

Same for me. It was a clapped-out pair of old bins I used (didn't want to risk my best bins) and I didn't get a good focus - nevertheless I'd set up in the car park at work and practically the entire workforce turned out during the morning tea-break to take a look. And they were really intrigued - even those who knew nothing about astronomy. Telling folks that this was the "first time since the 1880s" - that was the fascinating detail. That was my 'famous for 15 minutes' moment!

[661-pete]

Just to rub it in....it might have been our car....we just drove until we got clear sky...and it was awesome!

We didn't have a car - we'd gone over to France on the Eurostar, spending the rest of the week in Paris and just doing the day trip to the eclipse path, also by train. With hindsight, I wish I'd hired a car! C'est la vie....

Irony: we took a short break in Cornwall that same year, a month after the eclipse - and the place was virtually empty (and the weather was excellent)! The guy who ran the ferry to St Michael's Mount (we were there at high tide) was telling us how things were the month previous, when the place was packed-out (and folks were angry, depressed, and frustrated, and took it out on him...)

[Pauln]

For me it has to be "The Great disappointment(nebula) in Orion", last year from my garden it just could not be seen. I will try again this winter.

[NickH]

Travelling all the way to the big island of Hawaii in 1991 to see the longest solar eclipse of the 20th century and then being clouded out.

Then, after travelling much too far in a yellow school bus to the centre line, being told that those who stayed at the hotel saw it through thin clouds .

All made worse because I only went because seeing an eclipse was on my bucket list.

However, it was all made better in 1994 when I went to Chile and saw the eclipse in the high Andes

--

Martyn.

Of all the places in the world, I would have expected Hawaii to be near the bottom of the list of locations with 'high risk of cloud cover'. You must have been gutted to say the least.

Kuaii I believe has one of the highest levels of rainfall anywhere on Earth?

http://www.mykauairealty.com/default.asp_Q_f_E_cpg_A_pg_E_KauaiRainfallMap

Makes Wiltshire look dry...

lol

[beamer3.6m]

Perhaps to redress the balance (and so as not to put off any newbies browsing this thread!) - we should post our astro success stories as well?

Can we stick to the dissapointments as per my original question, the rest of SGL deals with the success stories.

Keep em' coming

[661-pete]

Can we stick to the dissapointments as per my original question, the rest of SGL deals with the success stories.

Keep em' coming

OK, OK, it was only a suggestion...

My recollections go back 50 years plus, so I have a lot of time-scale! I recall many more comet 'duds': Ikeya Seki in the 1960s (I was up there with my Dad on the Downs at the crack of dawn but didn't see anything: it was brilliant but badly placed for Northern observers). Comet West in the 1970s, I think a combination of work pressure and bad weather prevented me from making any early-morning comet forays. McNaught last year - brilliant but I never found it - bad weather again!

There was a very bright nova (not a supernova) in the 1970s - V1500 Cyg. I think it was called, which reached 2nd mag. but I never saw it - long spell of bad weather again.

Not being able to make anything much out of spirals - visually - well that's not really a 'disappointment' to me because I've known for a long time that it wouldn't be possible with my eyesight! After all Lord Rosse with his 72-inch could only just make out M51 - OK we have better optics than Rosse, you don't need 72" to see a spiral nowadays, but we also have more LP.....

A modern and ongoing disappointment for me, is that from my back garden in LP Sussex I cannot pick up M33 in binoculars. It ought to be possible: maybe other people can, but I can't. From a darker site (France), of course, it's an easy object for me in the bins, as is M81.

[steviejasp]

Haleys comet, back in 1980 something iirc. Saw the advert for a glimpse through a scope by the local astro club. I went down to the carpark near the seafront in my new (to me ) 1970 Mach 1 Mustang, queued up with all the other folk. Looked through the scope and it was so unremarkable, ive honestly forgotten what it looked like. Got back in my Mustang and laid rubber all over Worthing, Ah the things we do when we were young

[The Warthog]

For me, it was the three galaxies in the Bottom end of Leo. I was in mag 6.5 skies, and could see two places where there was a slight difference in the blackness of the background (I never saw the third one) and I had to ask a young astronomer near me to look and confirm that I was seeing galaxies. I gave up on faint galaxies after that. Give me clusters, nebulae, planets and the Moon!

[themos]

The Transit of Venus, 2004, Oxford.

It was a glorious sunny day with lots of scopes laid out in the parks. I had not been bitten by the bug yet. Apparently, until recently you could find pictures on the web of the crowds enjoying the spectacle ...

...of two ladies wondering around topless! heavenly orbs and all that.

normal service will be resumed shortly.

[Tiny]

What was the disappointment in the Transit plus ladies? Did you want blokes? :shock:

[Talitha]

My biggest disappointment was missing the November 2006 Mercury Transit... the next one is in early May of 2016.

It was totally overcast but I went out anyway, in hopes of getting a few pics through breaks in the clouds like I did for the sunrise Venus Transit in early June of 2004. No luck, though. I went out to the field and waited.. and waited.. and waited.. even had to open a patio umbrella over the equipment a few times when it started to drizzle.

What a Geek, eh? :geek:

[themos]

What was the disappointment in the Transit plus ladies? Did you want blokes? :shock:

I missed the whole thing

[FLO]

Mars! Have yet to see anything more than some colour and shading, the polar ice cap would be nice!

First view of M31 through an ETX105. (I now know it was completely the wrong scope. I have since seen it through a number of better suited scopes under a dark sky and it really is fantastic).

[oohmygod831]

I think my only disappointing moment so far is in my own inexperience, ie looking for something and not being able to find it (that doesn't include looking for something in the house when my wife has tidied up and put it in a SAFE place!!)

My latest example would be trying to find M13. I followed all the guidelines in Turn Left at Orion but still couldn't find it, gutted.

On the upside though, when i do find something (M31) then i feel amazing that i have seen something so far away, no matter how it looks in the scope, but wouldn't it be cool if it looked like the Hubble photos!

[Nostromo]

Here's a funny and kind of dissapointing Mars story. I showed some friends of mine Mars when it was at it's absolute best - after dinner and a few bottles of wine. My friend Pete spent ages at the eyepiece muttering to himself in amazement. Later when we were all back inside an the scope was put away he said something like "Really amazing with funny swirly patterns, but what I can't figure out was why there was this huge hole in the middle, kind of like a donut!". It was my old M715 Muksutov and I thought I'd made sure everyone how to use the focus, but looks like I missed Pete who was last in line. I guess Pete missed the big Mars show... But he did get so get to see some really cool tube currents