by Marek Cichanski
George Feliz and I observed at MB tonight, and it was the best MB night I've ever seen. Hands down. No two ways about it. It was the Black Cloud Night to end all black cloud nights.
I didn't take any real notes, as I was having too much fun marveling at how great it was. Here are some of the things that stand out:
As sunset and twilight came on, it just seemed like it would be a good night. The transparency seemed really good, everything had a crisp, scrubbed look in the late evening light.
The moon was hanging fairly low over the western horizon as it got dark, and the seeing was remarkably good. George and I were both using 6" scopes (his was a dob, mine was a maksutov), and we had very steady views at around 180x. Tons of fine detail was visible. Nice views of the Arago alpha and beta domes, and of the Apollo 17 landing site. I'd give the seeing a solid 4 out of 5 on my personal scale, maybe even a 4.5.
Then it was time for double stars. Two words: Split Antares.
The diffraction rings around stars were really steady, most of the disruption seemed to be thermal stuff in our scopes. By using an Ultrablock filter, the companion of Antares popped right out. (Great idea, George!) After seeing it several times, I turned off the clock drive, and sure enough, it was in just the right P.A. Without the filter, I saw the companion once or twice, very fleetingly.
Also had very nice splits of Nu Scorpii and the Double Double. The bright pair of Nu Sco showed some great, steady Airy discs, with clean black space in between.
The moon set around 11:10, and it started to get fairly dark. By midnight, the light domes in the east were very noticeably diminished. Any thoughts of a systematic program of bagging double stars or the last few H400 objects went out the window. It was time for eye candy. We had tons of fun with the usual suspects.
The Milky Way was noticeably better than any that I've ever seen at MB. The mottled detail from the Large Sgr Starcloud to Cygnus was incredible. I kept wanting to reach for some sunscreen. I think I understand what the Northern Coalsack is, now.
Pipe Nebula- naked eye. The long middle crossbar of Barnard's E - naked eye. (for both of these, it helped that I had once seen them from Shingletown, but they were there at MB tonight.)
I just about had puppies when I looked at the Milky Way in binos. Maybe I've seen this level of detail from LSA or Shingletown, but it doesn't stand out in my memory. Unbelievable numbers of dark nebulae plainly visible. Clusters and bright nebulae were very distinct. All of the key factors were there - dark sky background, excellent transparency, steady seeing.
We bagged Barnard's Galaxy in our 6" scopes. It was a little bit more visible in George's. George noted that it had been noticeably easier with that aperture from Plettstone, so we didn't have Sierra skies, but they were exceptional by MB standards. We also bagged the galaxy next to M13.
Around 1 or 1:30, the Turkish ornithologist and his pulchritudinous companion returned from their night-time birding session.
Yes, you read that right. There was a couple that had a permit to do some birding after dark. They had cameras and whatnot. They were some ways away, down a trail, and we didn't see them until they came back to the MB lot. They knew we'd be there, because I'd talked to them in daylight. They were very nice, and we gave them an impromptu star party. Geez, what did we show them? Lots of stuff... M8, M13, M22, M57, M31, B86, the Double Double...oh shoot, we forgot Albireo. It was a lot of fun. By the time they showed up, George and I were really psyched about how dark and clear it was, and we were really enjoying what was clearly a night to remember. M57 in particular looked nearly as good in our 6" scopes as it had looked in my 10" scope with an OIII filter a few nights before. A whole bunch of stuff looked like that, in fact.
Shortly after they left, at 1:40, we saw what looked like a plane moving rapidly across the sky, from near Fomalhaut right past Nunki. It was leaving a glowing green trail. I whipped out my binos and saw that it was orange and involved in flames, or some sort of incandescence. I suddenly realized that it looked just like pictures I'd seen or re-entering space vehicles. It was amazing. Then it faded, in an equant-shaped cloud, and seemed to intermittently re-brighten before fading for good. We figured that it was something out of Vandenburg. Maybe we were seeing a launch and staging of a booster, or maybe a re-entry of some sort? The trail hung around for a while, drifting and distorting. Looked like the Veil Nebula.
Speaking of which, late in our session I pulled out the ED80 and we did some wide-field viewing. The Double Cluster was awesome. M24 rocked. M31 was very bright and distinct, and M32 and M110 popped right out. Remember, this was right in the middle of what's usually the light dome. Then it was time for the Veil...
We had to be careful that the Terminagler (with an OIII on it) and the diagonal didn't pull the focuser tube right of the scope, since it was pointed straight up.
The upshot: The entire Veil complex in one eyepiece field, including Pickering's Triangle. A background of ink-black sky and countless bright pinpoint stars. One for the ages.
We even looked at Finnish Triangle #14. George seemed to recall that by coincidence, 14 stars in that triangle yields mag 6 skies. I suck at those triangles, I once got mag 5.8 on a great night at Shingletown. Go figure. George saw 13 to 14 stars with the triangle at the zenith, so the sky was probably basically a solid mag 6.
George was packed up first, and as I was closing the gate behind him, I noticed that the Bay Area was gone. Only the faintest hint of light far to the east. The fog was significantly darker than Wednesday night. Even less light coming from its east edge. As I finished packing up after George left, I tried a few other demonstrations of how dark it had gotten, even in the east.
Have you ever seen M81 and M82 from Montebello? Of course you have. Have you ever seen them in a 3" scope? You may have done that. Have you seen structure, including strong hints of the transverse dust lane in the Cigar Galaxy, using that same 3" scope? You might well have done that, too.
Ever do these things with the Big Dipper on the northern horizon? With the galaxies at their nadir, only a few degrees above the northeastern horizon? That's how freaky dark it was. M33 was well visible in my ED 80 when it was only 30 degrees above the eastern horizon. I could see seven stars in the Pleiades when they were only 15 or 20 degrees up. I wish I had noted all of the stars that were visible in Perseus, it was amazing. Milky Way through Cassiopea and all the way to Perseus.
We had a nice view of the Helix. I'm sorry that I didn't try for Uranus naked-eye. The North America Nebula was very bright in binos and naked eye, and the 'Gulf of Mexico' was very plain in binos.
Driving down, the fog was a lot thicker than Wed. I had to go real slow in places, not just because I didn't want to hit deer, but because it was hard to see where the road went. This was serious fog.
I've probably forgotten some key details, but you get the gist. It was a wonderful, wonderful night at MB. The fog has been very cruel to us at times this year, but it made up for an awful lot of that last night. Wow! I had a ton of fun observing with George, too. To whatever powers that be made this happen, thank you, thank you, thank you! I am a truly lucky man.
Posted on sf-bay-tac Jul 23, 2004 05:06:25 PT
Converted by report.pm 1.2 Jan 04, 2005 19:52:48 PT