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Saturday Night Viewing at Area 51 in Big Cypress National Preserve
November 22, 2003
Jay Albert
My compliments and gratitude to our president, Fred Lehman, for suggesting
that we all gather at a rest stop on I-75 and follow him to Area 51 in a
caravan. If not for Fred, I'd probably still be looking for the turnoff.
In addition to Fred, Ben Kolstad, Mike Gruber and I formed the ASPB
contingent. There were an additional 10 people in our car caravan, some
from the club headquartered at Markham Park in Broward County. When we
reached the observing site, Ron d'Orea was already setting up his 18
Starmaster GOTO with a few other people. Additional vehicles arrived
during the observing session until we had a total of 20 people or more
with 13 telescopes plus a pair of tripod mounted 70mm binoculars. Fred's
14" Meade was the second largest scope. Other scopes ranged from a small
refractor to a 12.5" dob.
The fair weather clouds evaporated as twilight deepened and the
temperature dropped. We knew observing was beginning in earnest when,
like a signal, Fred's sharp, green laser shot into the night sky. While
the falling temperature made for unstable seeing (3-4/10 on the ALPO
scale), transparency was better than 6th magnitude and the Milky Way
blazed across the sky.
I started out with the planets while waiting for the end of astronomical
twilight (when the sun is more than 18° below the horizon). Mercury was
already in the trees on the opposite bank of the canal and Venus, very
low in altitude, was a boiling gibbous disk. Mars showed a minuscule
south polar cap, the dark regions Cimmerium in the east and Tyrrhenum
in the west and a bright Hesperia in the middle at 224x and 311x with
a W23A red filter. The image was in constant motion and popping in and
out of focus, however, so fine detail on the 12 arcsecond disk couldn't
be seen.
After a quick Mars sketch, it was dark enough to start the deep sky
observing I came for. First I filled a couple of requests from other
participants and showed them the globular clusters M13 and M2. My plan
was then to concentrate on large, faint objects low in the southern sky --
stuff that was difficult or impossible to see from my light polluted
backyard. I put an f/6.3 focal reducer on my NexStar 11 GPS and moved
to the southern Aquarius/Sculptor/Cetus region ranging from declinations
of -25° to -40°. My first target was the Helix Nebula, a 13' diameter,
and low surface brightness planetary nebula. The object was dim at 55x,
but leaped in brightness and detail when I added a Lumicon OIII filter.
I also viewed the large NGC galaxies 55, 247, 253 and 300, the latter
being an especially faint face-on Sd spiral. Other targets in the
neighborhood included the small, bright "Saturn" planetary nebula and
the faint globular cluster, M72, which I failed to see in my backyard.
At area 51, I could not only see it, but also resolve outlying stars at
141x and 196x.
Having found my targets in the deep south, I moved north to the Veil
Nebula, a large, faint supernova remnant in Cygnus. While visible at
55x as a diffuse, gray glow, it came to life once I added the OIII
filter. The nebula brightened by orders of magnitude and showed
incredible twists and details through several adjoining fields.
Before taking off the focal reducer, I couldn't resist a look at the
M31, M32 and M110 galaxy field. Back at f/10, I observed the magnitude
10.4 galaxy NGC7331 and two of its very faint companions. I then
observed the faint galaxy group known as Stephen's Quintet. Using
averted vision and 224x, I saw 4 of the 5 galaxies. The four I saw
ranged from visual magnitude 12.7 to 13.3; the one I missed was 13.6.
I also enjoyed taking "walking around" breaks to check out the views in
other scopes and chat with other participants. I had some nice views
through the 18" and was fascinated with the images of M33 and M37 on
Fred's computer screen. Clouds began rolling in and the transparency
started deteriorating around 10:15. By 10:35 about half the sky was
covered and most of us (including Ben and I) decided to call it quits
and head for home. We had about 4½ hours of great observing and I
look forward to further sessions at Area 51.
Fred Lehman
The skies were clear and stable and the turnout was spectacular, with
more than twenty five people in attendance. The optical instruments
ranged from simple binoculars in an alt-az mount to an impressive 18 inch
StarMaster GOTO. A group of thin but distracting clouds rolled in about
10pm, but by then, everyone had checked off most if not all of the items
on their viewing list. The last of us left for home at 12:30am.
Since there were more than enough people to keep the party going, I
devoted my time to imaging. Once I acquired an object and started a
half hour imaging sequence, I was free to roam around, socialize, and
mooch a few views through the multitude of other scopes. Below are
images of the magnificent face on spiral galaxy M33, the enigmatic
Helix Nebula, the beautiful open cluster M37, and the faint obscure
nebula IC5146, the nearby galaxy M31, and the very young open cluster
M45. All images were taken through my daughter's 5" Nexstar
SCT using a f/3.3 focal reducer.
Michael Gruber
Each photographer faces a dilemma when trying to capture the mood of a
beginning Stargazing session: Catching the last daylight.
Bob Zanger
I just snapped a couple of pics last night. Figured I would send them to
you in case you wanted them.
Dave Lord
And who would drive up to a hundred miles hauling thousands of dollars
worth of precision scientific equipment in to the middle of the Everglades
to escape this massive pollution ??? To show just a few of the more than
25 set-ups that were present on this particular evening.....
(NOTE: Eyes are closed or heads turned in order to preserve night vision)
To mention just a few. In all, over twenty five optical systems were in
use at this secluded spot, making scientific observations that are
difficult to impossible to accomplish in the WPB / Broward / Dade county
areas. At the Fox observatory in Markham Park, another dozen or so were
also hard at work, but had a difficult time seeing very much through the
polluted skies of Broward County.
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