Transit of Mercury

[Robert Jardine]

Just went out and took a look. 15X15 IS binoculars with (solar
filters, of course). From my home in Cupertino.

It is about mid-transit. I didn't see any sunspots. Just one tiny
black dot near the center. Will check it again about every 1/2 hour.

I had been worried about fog, since it has been quite foggy here for
several days. But a beautiful clear day today!

Joe Bob sez: check it out!

[David Staples]

Clear in Redwood City as well. I have three scopes set up at work. Now I’m just waiting for the sun to clear the trees. I did get a quick glimpse a few minutes ago.

Dave


> On Nov 11, 2019, at 07:48, Robert Jardine <rlj...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Just went out and took a look. 15X15 IS binoculars with (solar

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[Steve Gottlieb]

Perfect view in clear skies from the beach at Pajaro Dunes (mid-Monterey Bay). Viewing through a 10” dob with full aperture solar filter and a Coronado PST.

I haven’t seen a sunspot the past 3 days - and virtually no solar prominences.

-- Steve

> On Nov 11, 2019, at 7:48 AM, Robert Jardine <rlj...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Just went out and took a look. 15X15 IS binoculars with (solar

[Richard Navarrete]

Gotta day. A little underwhelming visually.

[Philip Manela]

Watch it here:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H88JPegUnT0

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[mark....@resource-intl.com]

I viewed it in my planetarium program close enough to Mercury that it was a total solar eclipse.  Awesome!

Mark

On Nov 11, 2019 8:27 AM, "'Richard Navarrete' via The Astronomy Connection (TAC)" <sf-ba...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Gotta day. A little underwhelming visually.

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Sent from my iPad

>>> On Nov 11, 2019, at 8:08 AM, Steve Gottlieb <steve_g...@comcast.net> wrote:
>> Perfect view in clear skies from the beach at Pajaro Dunes (mid-Monterey Bay).  Viewing through a 10” dob with full aperture solar filter and a Coronado PST. 

>>
>> I haven’t seen a sunspot the past 3 days - and virtually no solar prominences.
>>
>> -- Steve
>>

>> On Nov 11, 2019, at 7:48 AM, Robert Jardine <rlj...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Just went out and took a look.  15X15 IS binoculars with (solar
>> filters, of course). From my home in Cupertino.
>>
>> It is about mid-transit. I didn't see any sunspots. Just one tiny
>> black dot near the center.  Will check it again about every 1/2 hour.
>>
>> I had been worried about fog, since it has been quite foggy here for
>> several days. But a beautiful clear day today!
>>
>> Joe Bob sez: check it out!
>>
>> --
>> Subscribers can post to sf-ba...@googlegroups.com
>> ---
>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Astronomy Connection (TAC)" group.
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>> To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/sf-bay-tac/CAGc8_QnRdVe14tT1LWT9m%3D_hbXWBO6rOeV3%2BDx61iqOVZj%2BL9A%40mail.gmail.com.
>
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[Alex]

The weather was super-cooperative here at Mountain View (even though a tiny bit hazy). Though, only 6 Googlers have been participating (1 imager, one visual, me going hybrid, and 3 guests). Too early an event for a typical Monday morning :)

Alex

-----
Alexandre Koukarine

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[David Staples]

I had a really good turn out at work.  I probably had 50 people stop by.  I had two 80mm scopes and a pair of 100mm binoculars set up, one of the 80mm scopes with a Lunt Ha filter and the other two with white light filters.  The sun is pretty quite right now, but there was a small (very small) prominence on the opposite limb of the sun from the transit.

Cheers,

Dave

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[Stephen Migol]

I set up my Stellarvue 70 mm refractor with herschel wedge at work.  Gave every employee at our small office a personal introduction so that they knew what they were seeing.

Great to do outreach in a little way.

Stephen

On Mon, Nov 11, 2019 at 11:11 AM Alex <alex.k...@gmail.com> wrote:

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[Steve Gottlieb]

It’s a small astronomical community —

A few people wandered through the parking lot at Pajaro Dunes where I set up my scope.  One was a woman (Barbara) and her grandson.  I invited them to take a look and she mentioned her son-in-law was an astrophysicist at Berkeley.  So I replied I’m a serious amateur and she asked if I heard of her son-in-law — Alex Filippenko!  I was hoping she might call him to come downstairs to look through my scope (ha-ha), but she said he was at an international conference.  We started talking about solar eclipses, which Filippenko leads, and it turns out we were neighbors at the same place (Sunriver resort) in central Oregon for the 2017 eclipse.

Steve

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[m.pa...@yahoo.com]

Nice views at Baylands Palo Alto. My Sunrise pics over distant trees were a flop but did snap this avian interloper pic, planet to upper right.

http://packerlighting.com/merc-bird1.jpg
(TMB 80 Herschel Wedge with Baader Green, Lumix handheld at Baader zoom ep. f/2, ISO 400, 1/800s)

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[Philip Manela]

m.packer, that is a GREAT shot!

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[Jamie Dillon]

Had a long look here in Salinas thru Lucy my ST90. Yes with an Orion tightly-fitting solar filter. Mercury is so crisply round, and so tiny next to the Sun.

Been lucky to see 2 Mercury transits and the Venus transit, all thru this same little scope, which also got to see the '17 eclipse.

[Iwan Tjioe]

Glad to hear everyone here had good views of the transit. I was able to catch it from Vargas Plateau in Fremont. Got up there before dawn and was able to polar align just before daylight snuffed out the stars. Kind of weird racing the sun to get set up. In the end it didn't matter because the go-to pointing for the sun was off and I wasn't able to capture the transit as it was rising above the horizon : (  Not sure why,  never had problems before. Solar tracking must be a quirky thing. In any case the rest of the morning went beautifully. Even had four people stop to take a look including a cement truck driver. Here's a video I made of the last 2 minutes: https://youtu.be/UL4lhecqyU8