St. Lou, MO Astronomy

I found a new trick for the image processing of the images of the nebulae, and reprocessed a few of them. The results are much better imo. The colors aren't as vibrant, but I got rid of a lot of the graininess, and was able to get a lot more detail in the images.

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I received an e-mail saying that the weekend of August 27th Mars will be the closest to the earth than it's been (or will be) in a long time. It says that it will appear to be the size of a full moon when viewed with the naked eye. Can this be right?...because it sounds like a stretch to me. The size of a full moon when viewed through a telescope maybe?

Where's tehexpert?

 

I think I've seen the Email you're talking about.

However, it's not accurate. The August 27th date was from 2003 in which Mars made it's closest approach since 60,000 years ago. Unfortunately, I didn't get to see it because it was cloudy where I was, but I did get to a few weeks later on September 6, 2003, which is when I met my girlfriend.

While this was the closest approach in recorded history, it still looked nowhere near as large as the full moon. Even knowing what I was looking for, I was barely able to tell that Mars was anything other than a very bright point of light.

But Mars does make a fairly close approach again this year. The date for closest approach this year will be October 29th (the night before my girlfriend's birthday...).

 

Oh, weird...I thought I edited that last post. As soon as I put it up there, Tim says, "Oh, I found out that email is a couple of years old".

Thanks though, Jon. I'll have to see what it looks like in October.

 

I'm going to be going out on Thursday night/Friday morning to watch meteors. Anyone want to come? Also, does anyone have a recommendation for a nice dark sky locations with a good view of the sky that's accessible all night?

 

Snopes currently has an article on the Mars approach.

 

I'm interested in going, but I have no suggestions as to where to go... It is time for the Perseid's is it not?

 

Yep. Perseid time.

 

Jumping back to the Mars topic, it's tonight at roughly 10:30 that Mars will be making it's closest approach for the next several decades. Look towards the east and it should be a very noticeable reddish object about 30º up.

If you're wanting to see another planet, check out the south west after the sun sets. Venus is easily visible in the twilight and becomes even more striking once the skies become fully dark.

I snapped a picture of it the other night:

[image=http://s94958815.onlinehome.us/astronomy/images/venusoverkansas.jpg]

I didn't have my tripod with me so it's a bit blurry and Venus is pink partially due to it being low in the atmosphere and partially because I played with the color contrast to make the sunset more dramatic.

 

It's been brought to my attention via Dajuan, that Christiana was lucky enough to witness two bright fireballs the other night. It looks like the annual Taurid meteor shower might be putting on an unusually good display this year. Usually the Taurids are extremely weak (I've never bothered to go out and observe that's how lousy their reputation is), but there's been a lot of reports on people seeing fireballs. they should be peaking this weekend so if you have a chance to get out to a dark location with clear skies, I recommend going for it.

If you want more information, it can be found here

 

Jon, it was awesome! I have never seen the likes before and I have spent a lot of time out looking. I mean, I really thought at first it was a plane, since there was a loud noise in the background but then it fizzled out, and other one was right behind it.

Here is a link to NASA and an article about it...I haven't been the only one to see this!!

 

Looks like the exact same article I posted, just one a different website. I wonder who stole it from whom.

 

LOL Mine came through the NASA newsletter via my email. That is funny...

 

I get newsletters from so many different astronomy publications... But I generally delete them without reading them because I've realized that I generally read about the info in other places before they organize the letters and get it sent out.



Oh yeah, and if you don't get to see anything good for these Taurids, remember that the Leonids peak on Nov 19th. The rates of meteors per hour is much higher (although fireballs aren't as frequent as they apparently are with these Taurids).

 

I took a pretty cool picture tonight. Well, more like several pictures, but I made a nice little panoramic that features Mars, the Moon, and Venus.

Check it out here. Let me know what you think!

 

It's a really nice picture but Mars and Venus are really hard to see.
I hear that there is supposed to be a meteor shower either tonight or tomorrow. Anyone heard anything about it?

 

Aside from the end of the peak of the Taurids tomorrow, the next meteor shower (the Leonids) won't peak until the 19th. Unfortunately, that's also the week of the full moon, so it will probably wash out all but the brightest ones.

 

I had to read that twice. I thought you said Turds instead of Taurids.

That sucks the next one is during the full moon.

 

They would be hard to see in the city anyway...

 

I can usually see them here in Jennings.

 

I was out for the persieds this summer on an extremely humid night (terrible for seeing anything in the sky because it reflects back all the light from the ground) and was still able to catch a few per hour.