Fear from the Black Forest Star Party, 2003/8/31 UT

I had attempted to bag the minuscule Martian satellites named Fear and
Panic, better known as Phobos and Deimos, several times before and
during the BFSP last week without success. These attempts included
using instruments as large as Russ Lederman's Denkmeier Two binoviewer
equipped 20" ATM Dob, the 20" Starmaster Sky Tracker Dob belonging to
Gary Honis, and Tom Whiting's new 30" ATM Dob. Much to my chagrin I
learned that my observing partner Tony Donnangelo had seen both on
Thursday night through Nick Zallar's 16" ATM Dob. Unfortunately, I was
elsewhere at the time.

Friday night was a rainy one in Potter County and the forecast for
Saturday night seemed to be in a state of flux. However, the gods of
the weather decided to smile upon the assembled masses on Saturday
night. The skies cleared by nightfall and were steady and transparent
for the course of the night.

After some productive satellite and deep-sky observing I ventured over
to Gary's 20" just prior to the time of the maximum eastern elongation
of the 10.5 magnitude Fear. Gary was imaging Mars with a web cam. He
turned up the gain to search for Phobos, a technique he had used
previously, but we weren't to detect any suspicious pixels.

Soon afterward Nick walked over and related that he was seeing Phobos
with his 16". I immediately returned with him and put my eye to the
ocular. At first I wasn't able to see a thing! However, after a few
minutes Phobos popped into sight and I was able to hold it steadily
rather easily without the use of an occulting bar.

Eventually I returned to Gary's scope. By this time he'd placed an
ocular equipped with an occulting bar into the focuser. After working
the control paddle for a bit I finally brought Phobos into view. It
was easier to see with the larger aperure and the occulting bar. We
then tried to locate Deimos. Gary mentioned that he thought he saw it
in one of the diffraction spikes to the west of the planet but I was
unable to catch a glimpse of the 12.6 kilometer-sized rock.

We had some excellent views of Mars that night. From time to time
incredible detail was revealed. Novus Mons was quite distinct from the
SPC and the Pipe (Sinus Sabeus and Sinus Meridiani) was very well
placed. The North Polar Hood was unmistakable through Dave Barrett's
24" Tectron Dob.

Dave Mitsky

(Dave Mitsky) wrote in message . com...
Hi Dave,
Thanks for the BFSP report. I understand there was a 15 inch
refractor there also. Did you get a chance to view through it?

Cheers,
Tom Mack

Dave Mitsky wrote :

. . We had some excellent views of Mars that night.
From time to time incredible detail was revealed . .

Yes, the seeing was very good at times. In checking around the field
I missed many good scopes, but the best views I had were through a 10"
LX 200, 5" f/15 refractor with D&G lens, and a ATM 8" f/8 Dob job
including homemade mirror. This one showed the most detail, had baffle
rings and a long tube extension in front of the focuser. Sorry I
forgot the name of the maker, but my hat's off to him.

The highlight of the party for me was a tremendous bolide at 12:30
AM Sun. morning. I happened to be talking to someone and was pointed
in exactly the right direction to see the fire ball light up just
under the Big Dipper's handle and slowly decend vertically, shedding
incandescent fragments like slow motion sparks. I estimate a magnitide
akin to that of the quarter moon. It looked somewhat like a long-lived
Roman candle ball on the way down. It took about 7 seconds to travel,
extinguished at about 12 degrees elevation and moved so slowly that I
assumed it was at a considerable distance; maybe 50 to 100 miles.
Therefore I was surprised that many reported hearing a boom around the
time it extinguished. I think I heard it, but was so exited that I
can't be sure. A loud mass "OH!" and "AH!" went up from the half of
the crowd that was looking north. I was shouting "Turn around! Turn
around!" to the guy I was talking to, and he finally did and saw the
finale, but he told me he had been looking at the illumination from it
lighting me up.

Aurora last year, Bolide this ; What the hell is going to happen at
BFSP next year ?

Howie

Howie Glatter:
Aurora last year, Bolide this ; What the hell is going to happen at
BFSP next year ?

*****

Great description; makes me wish I could have been there.

As for next year--

An as-yet-undiscovered comet of with a head of magnitude 0 and huge,
naked-eye dust and ion tails, on the Celestial Equator, transiting at
midnight?

A large asteroid striking the earth some 1000km south of the BFSP so
that a few people have time to get pix of the fireball before dying?

A near-miss by a large asteroid that is partially disentegrated by its
grazing the outer atmosphere, and causes a meteor shower with c 250,000
per hour, with meteorites raining everywhere and two scopes and several
vehicles with moderate damage, but no one seriously injured?

Armageddon?

The Second Coming?

Davoud

--
usenet *at* davidillig dawt com

(Tom Mack) wrote in message om...
(Dave Mitsky) wrote in message . com...
Hi Dave,
Thanks for the BFSP report. I understand there was a 15 inch
refractor there also. Did you get a chance to view through it?

Cheers,
Tom Mack

Tom,

How've you been?

If there was a 15" refractor at the BFSP I didn't happen to run across
it. I did see an antique Cook refractor I believe and a 7.1"
Astro-Physics Starfire, however.

Dave Mitsky

Tom,

How've you been?

If there was a 15" refractor at the BFSP I didn't happen to run across
it. I did see an antique Cook refractor I believe and a 7.1"
Astro-Physics Starfire, however.

Dave Mitsky

Hi Dave,
Have been fine, thanks for asking.
Someone posted on another newsgroup that there was a 15 inch refractor
at BFSP. Must have been a typo - can't imagine anyone having a
portable 15 inch light bender.
Keep up with your great observing reports.

Cheers,
Tom Mack