Your favorite observations of 2024

[Akarsh Simha]

Welcome to the Adventures in Deep Space mailing list. The idea originated from Mark Wagner, and I quickly fell in line with it. It's very gratifying to see the membership of this list grow so quickly. The membership roster has some of the most well-known visual deep-sky observers in the world as well as some very enthusiastic folks with beginner or intermediate experience and smaller telescopes. This is exactly what we wanted – my interest in this hobby has been enriched and grown by interactions with people far more experienced than me, and we hope to bring that to everyone. I believe our hobby grows by sharing and learning from others.

I was thinking for a bit on what would be a good starting topic that everyone could pitch in on, and coming around to the turn of the year it's natural to feel nostalgic about all the good observing moments that occurred in 2024. I encourage everyone to share their favorite or most joyous observing moments of 2024. There's no specific number of objects, no fixed format, no aperture or obscurity requirements – you'll see I listed some very well-known targets below.

I guess I did not get to look at NGC 2024, the Flame Nebula, this year. But I did get to look at over 200 things and get the 28" telescope off the ground, so I consider this a very good observing year. I had the luxury of taking a break from my career which made me engage in the hobby with atypical fervor. Here's a selection of my favorite observations of 2024:

1. The Perseus Cluster (Abell 426)

In almost 20 years of deep-sky observing, I had never seriously studied this cluster. This year, I pointed scopes at it twice. First, a friend's new 16" dob in south India in January, and a second night in October with my 18" from our local Bortle 5 site. On the latter night, it was refreshing to go back to the basics – just the Interstellarum Deep-Sky Atlas, no images, no go-to – and I also enjoyed the company of a friend with a similar interest in picking out the galaxies! We picked out 12 galaxies in all, of course there are many many more within the reach of an 18" from a dark sky.

2. Hockey Stick Galaxy (NGC 4656)

I made a detailed sketch of the view of this galaxy through my 18", over two nights. The sketch is available here although as is typical, it looks better on my logbook. I was able to pick out several HII / star-forming regions.

3. "Spade" (VV 59)

Jimi Lowrey introduced this fantastic object to us a few years ago. This really cool galactic trainwreck lies in Boötes. Through Jimi Lowrey's 48" telescope, it was truly a sight at 1040×, here is the sketch:

4. Twin Quasar

This object has always been elusive in my 18" the few times I tried it. The best I got of it was back in 2012 when I noticed an elongated "something". My 28" at GSSP had no trouble with it. It was low in the sky, but Jonathan Lawton wanted to see it and I was happy to look for it. It was clearly an elongated glow that resolved intermittently.

5. Pillars of Creation in M 16

I've seen this a number of times, but this August I pointed my 28" at Eagle Nebula for the first time. There was a dark patch in the nebula, and by simply applying averted vision, the pillars became visible! I was surprised at how easy it was in a 28" in comparison to my 18" where we had to struggle to pick out the pillars.

6. Owl Cluster (NGC 457)

A bunch of us had a memorable view of this object through 25×100 binoculars this August. The shared experience added to the joy of viewing this cluster. It really did look like an owl.

7. C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS

Not a deep-sky object, but any description of astronomy this year would be incomplete without a mention of the total eclipse and C/2023 A3. I was pleasantly surprised when I just went out an hour after I landed in the US, looked over the neighboring apartment buildings in the west and there it was, tail and all!

8. Nearly Horizon-to-Horizon Zodiacal Band

This was in October in the Indian Himalayas at 14000 feet elevation (Hanle) in the morning hours. I haven't often seen a sky where the Zodiacal Band stretches from nearly horizon-to-horizon visually, making an X with the Milky Way. Perhaps this is only my second or third time. The sky quality varied night-to-night, I think primarily due to airglow. This was only seen on one of the 5 nights I was there.

9. NGC 520

I was surprised when I pointed my 18" to NGC 520 in November on a night of very poor seeing but great transparency. The tidal tail was immediately picked up! The galaxy looked like it had a "Y-shaped" spikey appearance. I confirmed the direction and length of the tidal tail.

10. The NGC 383 Chain

Although I've seen this object earlier, it was almost a decade ago. Early December, I pointed my 18" to the object, and the eight galaxies decorated the FOV of a 10mm Delos like a chain of jewels. It was a fascinating sight!

Clear Skies in 2025,

Akarsh

[Wouter van Reeven]

Hi all,

Very nice report Akarsh! And thanks again for setting up this mailinglist.

For me 2024 has mostly been observing with one of my 12" dobs from our very light polluted terrace west of Madrid, Spain. I observed more than 40 small or tiny planetary nebulae from Ophiuchus and Aquila to Perseus and Auriga. My quest continues and I hope to expand to Orion, Monoceros and Canis Major. And I might be able to go to Chile again in 2025 so perhaps I can expand to the southern Milky Way as well!

Clear, transparent and moonless, dark skies to all!

Wouter van Reeven

— 
Lime and limpid green a second scene,
A fight between the blue you once knew.
Floating down the sound resounds
Around the icy waters underground
[Pink Floyd - Astronomy Domine]

On 31-12-2024, at 08:02, Akarsh Simha <akars...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Mark Wagner]

On 12/30/2024 23:02, Akarsh Simha wrote:

Welcome to the Adventures in Deep Space mailing list. The idea originated from Mark Wagner

HI Akarsh,

It is indeed gratifying to see who has already joined this list.  I felt with ADS itself, a mailing list dedicated for use by active visual observers was a natural combination.  Your new stewardship and improvements of ADS along with Mark and Vishal is a great long term guarantee for the web-site's viability, especially with Steve's (and my background) continued participation.

Your best of 2024 is a great first post.  I am very happy too, to see a posting by Wouter that takes the dark and deep natural nature of this list, and allows/encourages bridging the gap to more urban/suburban deep sky, inviting a wider range of experiences and possibilities.  For example, much of my observing going forward will focus on good "dark" sites near home (San Francisco bay area) that are more within reach of a larger number of observers that can't regularly travel 3-6 hours to observe.  I think all can be welcome on a list such as this, from most experienced to least as long as they have interest.  I'm interested in the continued viability and success of visual astronomy itself, inviting more participants.

Wouter - I would be very interested in your PN observing from close to Madrid.  Its right up my (home's backyard) alley.

Now, my best of 2025 was from a "non-dark" site (Herschel 400 limiting).  Observing with my 30 year astronomy friend Richard Navarrete recently at Henry Coe State Park an hour from home, I experienced a truly rare night of exquisite seeing and transparency, allowing astonishingly detailed viewing. Simple pleasures.

Happy New Year and great 2025 astronomy to all!

Mark

[Mark McCarthy]

Since I posted on another list about my 2024 top 5 DSOs, at the risk of boring everyone to tears, I'll share some double star observations from my red-zone back yard in the SF Bay Area.  With >600 observations in 2024, it is difficult to pick the "best" -- but these did elicit an exclamation point from me when I wrote my log.

This first group with a 6-inch f/15 refractor (with a 60mm f/16 Tasco strapped to it):

JC 6 AB: 6-inch; 250x: ! Light orange A, grey B lies on A's diffraction ring, faint, 3 Dm. Very pretty diamond ring effect.  No Gaia parallax data for the secondary.  There hasn't been much change in PA or separation since discovery, but an orbit could be tried all the same.  JC = W.S. Jacob, "Captain, Bombay Engineers" who observed with a Dolland telescope of 5-feet focal length -- probably a 4-inch refractor -- from "Poonah" = Pune, India.  Wikipedia: "While in England in 1855 Jacob wrote "A few more words on the Plurality of Worlds" in which he suggested life on other planets ("probably that some of the known planets are inhabited, not very improbable that all of them are"), and described his computation of stellar orbits for the Royal Astronomical Society. Jacob posited that apparent orbital anomalies in the binary star 70 Ophiuchi might be caused by an exoplanet. While these anomalies are now thought to have other causes, this was the first serious claim by an astronomer to have detected an exoplanet using scientific methods: 100 years before the first exoplanet was conclusively detected and well before the science of exoplanets was even in its infancy. Professor David Kipping states that the ‘claim is so remarkable because Jacob was making tiny measurements (80 milliarc seconds or 22 millionths of a degree) with the naked eye, at a time when he wasn’t even sure whether Newton’s law of gravity held sway in distant parts of the galaxy. While Jacob... was ultimately proved wrong, he had the audacity to try.'"

18h 25m 21.02s -20° 32' 29.9" P.A. 280.00 sep 1.7 mag 5.03,7.43 Sp K1III+A1V dist. 125.79 pc (410.33 l.y.)

STF2315 AB: 6-inch; 250x: ! White A, very extremely faint B resolves with foveal coaxing and I can then hold it direct, very closely split clean. No Gaia parallax data for either star.  Sixth Orbit Catalog grade 4 orbit, 2094-year period.

18h 24m 58.46s +27° 23' 41.3" P.A. 117.00 sep 0.6 mag 6.57,7.77 Sp A0V+A4V dist. 117.51 pc (383.32 l.y.)

STT 350 AB: 6-inch; 250x: !! Incredible pair, super delicate, pure white faint stars, 1 Dm, in a star field of bright white stars (open cluster NGC 6633, which is gorgeous, large loose stars in an E-W arc). Disappointingly, Gaia DR3 shows -32% parallax range overlap, it is not likely binary.

18h 26m 52.89s +06° 25' 23.9" P.A. 166.00 sep 1.9 mag 7.79,9.39 Sp A0III

STF2320 AB: 6-inch; 250x: ! Super fine white A and 2 Dm B, hairline split.  58% parallax range overlap, 334 AU weighted separation, 3.2+2.1 Msol, it is likely binary and needs an orbit.

18h 27m 45.89s +24° 41' 50.8" P.A. 1.00 sep 0.9 mag 7.14,8.90 Sp B9V dist. 256.41 pc (836.41 l.y.)

STT 368 AB: 6-inch; 250x: ! Close white A and blue B in perfect seeing, 1 Dm, just past hairline split.  4% parallax range overlap, 221 AU weighted separation, 1.9+2.4 Msol, it might be binary and needs an orbit.

19h 16m 01.84s +16° 09' 39.5" P.A. 218.00 sep 1.1 mag 7.53,8.49 Sp A9IV dist. 240.96 pc (786.01 l.y.)

STF2579 AB: 152; 200x: ! Excellent close pair, very bright A and faint B resolves outside A's first diffraction ring at 200x & 250x.  I also see it in the 60mm scope at 90x, but only with foveal coaxing and because I already knew where to look after seeing it in the 6-inch.  The refractor and small aperture suppress the bright star's diffraction and provides the contrast needed to see the companion.  No Gaia data for the secondary.  SOC grade 4 orbit, 657-year period.

19h 44m 58.44s +45° 07' 50.5" P.A. 213.00 sep 2.7 mag 2.89,6.27 Sp B9.5IV dist. 50.58 pc (164.99 l.y.)

Using a 7-inch aperture mask on my 20-inch f/5 dob:

AC 7 BC: 7-inch; 200x: ! Component of STF220, which is a 3.5 magnitude light orange star with a 10th magnitude wide companion.  This is BC, which while faint was resolved at 1" separation to an close unequal pair.  Brightens slightly with averted vision, the star images were cleaner with the 7-inch than full aperture.  PA to the NE, it's faint white pair near equal but nice close split.  SOC grade 1 orbit, 43.46-year period, it will be due east by 2040.  4% PRO, only 29 AU WS, 0.3+0.3 Msol, very interesting pair.

17h 46m 25.07s +27° 43' 01.4" P.A. 27.00 sep 1.0 mag 10.20,10.70 Sp M2.2V+M4V

 

With my 20-inch f/5 dob:

JEF1 AB: 20-inch; 1270x: Nusakan, 3 CrB.  With apodising mask and blue filter, I can detect the position angle of the elongation as SSE.  Currently 0.15", it will widen quickly in the next couple of years reaching apastron in 2028 at 0.314".  SOC grade 1 orbit, 10.54-years period, and probably the shortest period binary I've observed.

15h 27m 49.85s +29° 06' 19.8" P.A. 140.00 sep 0.15" mag 3.68,5.20 Sp A5+F2 dist. 34.28 pc (111.82 l.y.)

STT 535 AB: 20-inch; 1270x: Using an apodising mask and blue filter, at >500x the elongation was obvious, and bumping the magnification up to 1270x I had a clean split, slightly unequal stars with PA to the NE.  Spurious disks were fairly steady but there was a fair amount of dancing diffraction at this magnification.  I observed it in October 2020 with the 20-inch, when it was at 0.165", and it appeared single.  So this makes a handful of pairs in which I've been able to trace movement over the last few years.  We have another four years or so before the secondary makes its dive back toward the primary and will be undetectable visually.  What a fun observation, 5.71-year period!  SOC grade 1 orbit.

21h 14m 28.81s +10° 00' 25.1" P.A. 7.00 sep 0.33" mag 5.19,5.52 Sp F6V+F6V dist. 18.49 pc (60.31 l.y.)

BR,

Mark

 

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[Akarsh Simha]

Wouter, I too would be very interested in your list of bright planetaries. I'm going to be in light polluted Bangalore for a couple of months with not so much to do in the evenings during clear season, presumably with a 12" telescope. I'll make sure to carry my 5mm and 3.5mm eyepieces.

Eventually when you have it worked out, if you're okay with sharing it, it would make an excellent addition for Adventures.

Regards

Akarsh