Eclipse OR

by Bill Drelling

I brought my trusty Orion 120ST and set it up on the plaza. With a low power eyepiece it gave a wonderful widefield view. It was fun to watch as the earth's shadow slowly crept across the face of the moon. As second contact neared the milkyway began to come out. Admittedly the milkyway was only 1/100th of a magnitude brighter than the light pollution, but if you knew where to look you could see it. We pointed it out to the public and most of them were able to see it too. The other neat thing was that as second contact neared, field stars began to appear in the eyepiece--a very neat thing to see dim stars and the "full" moon in one FOV.

Lastly, the copper color of the moon was exceptional. I thought it looked redder than past lunar eclipses I have seen--ok, so maybe I've only watched 2 or 3, but still, it was a cool color. I ended up staying until the entire event ended and the moon was completely out of the shadow.

Interestingly, many people said that my inexpensive Orion 120ST gave the best view of the eclipse. Even the photographer from the Chronicle fired off about a hundred afocal images through my scope. Who knows, maybe one will make the newspaper!

Thankfully my boss agreed to let me come in late this morning, so there is time to catch a few winks before heading in to the office.

Bill Drelling