April 2009
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Archive for April 2009

Sir Patrick Moore, Ceres, and me

30. April 2009 by beckster.

Earlier this week I was contacted by the producers of the BBC program
“The Sky at Night” hosted by Sir Patrick Moore.

They were interested in using some of my images of the asteroid Ceres
for their upcoming show “Close Encounters” which will air at
12.40am (BST) on Monday 4th May (so late Sunday night) on BBC1, and
7.00pm on Monday 4th May on BBC4.

The BBC4 version is slightly longer and is probably the best one to
catch–this is according to the producer I have been talking to.

Here are the links for the shows. My images are in the show (it’s been confirmed by the producer) so figured I’d give you all a heads up just
in case you want to watch it.

<http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00kcwb9>

<http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00jvgxq>

The kicker is, I think only residents of the UK can watch so if you are in the UK, please watch and let me know how it looks!

It’s not apparent to me how we in the USA can see the program so I’ve posted a couple of the images here for you to ponder.

The top image was made April 28 and the bottom one was made 24 hours later. Ceres is in the upper right side of the frames and obviously moves.

The bright star on the left about midway down from the top is Algieba, (Gamma Leonis).

Posted in oddities & curiosities | Print | 3 Comments »

Moon, Pleiades and Mercury

26. April 2009 by beckster.

After looking at objects dimmer than flea scat at the Texas Star Party, it was nice to get back home this evening and look at a bright crescent Moon (with Earthshine) above the Pleiades open star cluster and Mercury!

I love TSP, but I also like being back home after a ten hour drive. Great to see everyone again, and will catch up and post LOTs of photos soon.

Posted in Looking up | Print | 3 Comments »

ISS pass over Fort Davis and a faint glimpse of Comet Yi-SWAN

19. April 2009 by beckster.

Nice and bright international space station pass over Fort Davis April 19 at 6:23 a.m. local time.

Comet Yi-SWAN is in this image too, but you can’t see it. I’ll try to make a nicer comet image for y’all (I’m back in Texas so I gotta talk the talk) when I get the G8 set up and can track.

The Texas Star Party begins today….things are looking good!!!

BTW- Jupiter and the Moon were all snuggly this morning, grabbed a snap of the duo, might post it later.

Nikon D70 on tripod

ISO 400

97 seconds @ f4

Posted in Looking up | Print | 3 Comments »