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KELLING REPORT:- 12.9.2010 Meade 16" LB

Doc

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Doc

Doc

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Meade Lightbridge 16" F4.5 FL1829mm

Sunday 12th September 2010

Kelling Heath Star Party

Clear

No Moon.

Out of the three nights we had at Kelling the Sunday was by far the best and this is when I did my observing report and a sketch of the Veil Nebula. My scope proved to be very popular and as always at these events a queue started developing throughout the evening. I must admit I loved showing the showcase objects to normal holiday makers and were bowled over by their comments. Even seasoned astronomers were astonished at how bright these objects were.

The skies were very dark and I would estimate Mag 5.7, I could easily make out M31, the double cluster and even M13 naked eye, so the seeing was pretty good as well. Most of the plots in the top of the blue field were taken by the East Midlands Stargazers and I must admit the group was fantastic and everyone had a great time, and I do hope we can do it again sometime.

I'm not exactly sure of the correct order of seeing these objects as my notes got a bit jumbled along the way, but the list of objects are correct.

The first object was a very impressive M27, commonly known as the Dumbbell Nebula, M27 was the first planetary nebula to be discovered. It is a shell of gas that was expelled from the nebula's central star. This object gets the name "dumbbell" from its hourglass, or dumbbell-like shape. Its distance is estimated to be about 1,250 light-years from Earth. This object was simply awesome, I have never seen so much detail and sharpness to it then I saw tonight, the distinct apple core shape was unmissable and I swear I even saw a glimpse of the central star embedded within it.

Next over to Draco to find the missing Messier that is M102 also known as Ngc5866. There is some uncertainty as to whether the galaxy is M102. Due to an 18th century error, M101 may have been misclassified as M102. It is widely believed that M102 may be a lenticular galaxy located in the constellation Draco. It is a dim object with a visual magnitude of only 9.9 and can be hard to find without dark skies and ideal observing conditions. Well Kelling did have dark skies and I could even see this one through my 28 Uwan, but the best view was through the 16 Uwan. The galaxy is pretty small at 5.2' x 6.5', the core is not really apparent but there is a brightening of the centre.

Up to Cassiopeia and I tracked down the Pacman Nebula Ngc281. I was really expecting to find anything as I have tried this nebula from my light polluted back garden and cannot even see it, well tonight was simply mind blowing, through the 16 Uwan I could see the shape pretty well but the best bit is I could make out the Pacman's open mouth. To say I was astonished is an understatement, I just could believe it. I also tried it with a O111 filter which improved the view slightly. Ngc281 is quite large at about 35' in diameter and shines at mag 7.

Staying in Cassiopeia I saw Ngc147 next, pretty large as galaxies go at 13' x 13.5' in size and mag 9.3 in brightness. It could be seen in the 28 Uwan but the 16 Uwan gave a more pleasent view, this galaxy seemed very diffused and had a very slight brighter core but this was only appeared with averted vision.

Not far from Ngc147 is another galaxy almost the same size but slightly brighter that is Ngc185. This was very easy to see in the 16 Uwan and even had a moderatly bright core, the oval shape was clearly seen.

Another new galaxy for me was Ngc278 also in Cassiopeia, this one turned out to be a little harder and took a while to find. It's pretty small at 2.4' in diameter and only 10.9 mag in brightness. Eventually found it using 16 Uwan and it appeared more planetary in form, being a small circular patch of light with a slightly brighter core.

Next was M33 located in the constellation Triangulum, M33 is a member of our local group of galaxies. It is a spiral galaxy with a diameter of 60,000 light-years. This object simply popped out at me while doing a sweep of the area in my 28 uwan. I spent a good 20 minutes observing this great Messier and after a while I could detect a hint of spiral arms, a fantastic object and one I have only glimpsed once before at Salisbury Star Party.

Next onto the highlight of the night or maybe the highlight of my astronomy lifetime and that is the Veil Nebula. I have seen this a few times but tonight with the 28 uwan and O111 filter I was shocked. The Network Nebula which if I'm correct is Ngc6992 & Ngc6995 curved out in front of my eyes like a crescent of light. It stood out so vividly I was shocked, I could detect so much mottling and filaments inside the nebula, it looked like a spiders web. It was so large I could not get the whole of the crescent into my FOV of the 28 Uwan which is 1.26°. But it was easy to sweep the whole of this lovely nebula up.

I then moved the scope upwards until 52 Cygni came into view and just below this was the Witch's Broom portion of the Veil that being Ngc6960. Once again it was out of this world, long strands of silk interweaving along the entire length of the nebula. This is the best I have ever seen the Veil and just goes to show what dark skies can do.

While moving between the two I also caught a glimpse of the centre portion of the Veil and Pickerings Triangle Ngc6979, this was no where near as easy to spot but I could still detect the strands of the Veil. Once the crowds had died down I revisted this and took a while to draw it. See the sketch here: http://stargazerslounge.com/imaging-sketches-unconventional/113910-kelling-sketches-veil-nebula.html

Staying in Cygnus I searched for IC5146 the Cocoon Nebula, it turned out to be a oval patch of light about 12' x 20' in size and mag 7.2 in brightness. It was very hard to observe and seemed better with averted vision. I could just make out some internal dark areas but these were borderline. O111 filter didn't seem to improve matters.

Moving on to Perseus I found Ngc1023 pretty easy in the 28 Uwan. Moving onto the 16 uwan I could detect a oval patch of light with a very bright central core. There appeared to be a bright star on it's northern boundary.

M81 and M82 were simply awesome and were greeted by loads of "Wow" moments by holiday makers and astronomers alike. Easily fitted into the same FOV in my 28 uwan but best view was of M82 the Cigar Galaxy. I could even see the two angled lanes inside the galaxy these appear to seperate the M82 into portions. This is the first time I have seen this visually and it was fantastic, I could not make out the expoding cigar formation but could clearly see the dark lanes.

Staying in Ursa Major I next saw M101 this a nearly face-on spiral with a bright centre and symmetric shape. It is located about 27 million light-years from Earth. With an estimated linear diameter of over 170,000 light-years, this is one of the largest disk galaxies known. M101 is a bright object with a magnitude of 7.9. This was easily located with the 28 Uwan and after prolonged observing I could detect a hint of the spiral dust lanes and the central core was definiely brighter and circular in formation.

Next I managed to get both M108 and M97 into the same Fov of my 1.26° 28 Uwan. M108 appeared as a spindle type galaxy with a much brighter central core on the opposite side of the FOV appeared M97. This planetary nebula got its name from the two round dark regions, which resemble the eyes of an owl. It is one of the fainter objects in the Messier catalog with a magnitude of only 9.9. The structure of M97 is unusually complex for a planetary nebula. It is illuminated by a 16th-magnitude star at its center. As with most planetary nebulae, its distance is not certain. Best guesses place it at about 2,600 light-years from Earth. Through the 16 Uwan I could detect one eye of the owl but the second one eluded me, even with the O111 filter inserted only one eye appeared.

Located in the constellation of Canes Venatici is an exquisite object known as M51, the Whirlpool Galaxy. This was one of Messier's original discoveries. He found it in 1773 while observing a comet. M51 is a beautiful example of a face-on spiral galaxy. The obvious spiral shape of this object is what gave it the name, Whirlpool. It was the first spiral galaxy to be discovered. Careful observation reveals that this object is actually two galaxies. The second, known as NGC 5195, is interacting with M51. The outer regions of the two galaxies actually touch each other. M51 is located about 37 million light-years from Earth. This object simply jumped out at me in the 28 uwan and after prolonged obseving I could detect the bridge connecting these two galaxies together and a definite hint of dust lanes.

Located in the constellation Scutum, M11 has been described as one of the richest and most compact open clusters. This cluster lies 6,000 light-years from Earth and has a diameter of about 21 light-years. It is composed of more than 2,900 stars, 600 of which have a visual magnitude brighter than 15. This cluster was simply awash with stars through the 28 uwan, there was just so many and I looked at it for ages, I detected mostly white stars with a few yellow ones between them, I could not distinguish the wild duck shape, but maybe there was simply too many stars to decipher the duck amoung them.

Last one of the night was Ngc 7331 & Stephen's Quintet, I wanted to check how easy this one was as the week before Kelling I saw these from my garden but I had to be under a blackout blanket for 15 minutes until they appeared, I needed to compare the two sites. Well the 28 uwan picked out Ngc7331 so easy it simply was there showing a lovely core and even a hint of mottling within it's formation. I moved the scope up to the place I know the Quintet resides and there they were. I could easily see 3 cores and even a hint of a another dimmer core as well. Strangely I would have thought the smudges would have been more promient but they were there so thats Ngc 7320, 7318, 7319 and a dim 7317. Ngc 7318 is two galaxies but I could not seperate them.

By now it was rather late so decided to call it a night and went and helped a fellow member with is astrophotography instead.

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Ant

Ant

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Thats a great read Doc.

You certainly saw more objects than I did. But I agree that the skies were pretty good, better than last year I think - but that could be down to the lack (or at least less than last year) of moisture in the air!

Cheers

Ant

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Doc

Doc

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Thanks for the report Doc it made interesting reading. I realised when packing up to go home that I had not done any visual, just fiddled about with camera and astrotrac. Reading your report helped me visualise what I could have been seeing :eek:

Armchair observing Bob can't beat it :D

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Doc

Doc

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great report Mick, wondered what you where typing on the laptop in the night but was to busy trying to get my gear to perform correctly,

great weekend, loved it loads so did Sam

LOL I wasn't typing as much as I've typed here. I have a sort of shorthand code I type and then decipher when I get home.

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Doc

Doc

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Fabulous report Mick! I'm so glad you were able to get a good look at everything under a dark sky... geeze, i bet your smile was as big and wide as the Milky Way. :D:eek:

I can see why you are always smiling now Carol. This is the first time I've had this dob under true dark skies and I was awestruck.

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barkis

barkis

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That is a very comprehensive account of your Sunday night Mick. I had returned home by then, but in hindsight I wish I had made the effort to look through more "Biggies".

I got some great views in MikeP's C11 SCT, Ian's Mak/N. and LintonG's 20" Obsession, which were breathtaking.

Observational Astronomy is very far from deceased is all I can say

Ron :D.

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John

John

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Superb report Mick :)

I really wish I'd been there to share in those dark skies - oh roll on SGL6 !.

Your description and drawings of the Veil complex are outstanding - I love this group of objects too :)

It's so nice being able to show others this magic as well - it seems to enhance our own appreciation when we share it with others.

Thanks for a great contribution as ever :icon_eek:

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