top 5 2024 observations

[Mark McCarthy]

With Mark's prompting, here's a summary of my best 2024 observations.  It was a fairly average year, with 43 outings both at home and at dark sky sites (not counting nearly daily solar observing).  I didn't get out to dark skies as much as I would have liked, but I made pretty good due.

5) Double Star Observations

Logged 602 double star observations, including calculations of the likelihood of them being true binaries.  These were all of stars which were supposed to be "physical" based on StelleDoppie and other sources.  The problem with these are they often don't take parallax into account.  Using Gaia DR3 data, I've found:

- 225 are likely binary and need orbital solutions.

- 30 might be binary but lack parallax data, so orbital solutions can be tried. 

- 56 are confirmed to be binary.

- 291 are neither binary nor physical at all.

Once I have time, I'll write the results up (plus another ~600 more observations from last year) and submit for publication.

4) 2024 Eclipse: 

We didn't travel to see the April 8, 2024 eclipse over Mexico and North America, though I wanted very much to.  The event was on the first day of school, and amazingly all the kids wanted to be in school.  I think my kids associate eclipses with the mosh pit that was the county fairgrounds in Madras, Oregon, where we camped out to see the 2017 eclipse.  Except for the eclipse itself, it wasn't a good experience for anyone.

So, I contented myself with viewing the partial eclipse from home.  Fortunately, we had good weather and good seeing.  I used my 6-inch f/15 refractor with a combo quark prominence filter.

I studied the prominences hanging off the sun's limb because I knew I would be able to see the moon in front of these features before first contact.  And sure enough I was able to watch the moon slowly cover over two large prominences, including a distinctive V-shaped one which was visible during totality by the naked eye.  As the eclipse was ending, I watched as these prominences re-emerged from behind the moon.  

During partiality I enjoyed seeing the uneven line of the moon's curved shape -- crater mountains as so on -- silhouetted across the sun.  Filaproms disappeared and reappeared and were partially covered by these subtle irregularities in the shadow.  

I continued to watch the moon's shadow as it approached final contact.  It seemed to accelerate as it moved further off the sun, but of course this was an illusion of perspective.  Smaller prominences reappeared along the sun's limb.  Best of all was watching the moon through final contact: I saw the hacksaw-blade looking chromosphere along the limb of the sun, separated by a thin black line.  As the moon moved off the limb it was still covering this very thin feature appeared as wedges on both sides, rapidly moving toward the point of the moon which made last contact, filling up the wedges with the tiny blades which popped up whole as the moon moved away.  Difficult to describe but very interesting to watch.

3) Gum Nebula

One weekday night in April I drove down to a dark site on the central coast.  Using PVS-14 night vision, with a 3x magnifier and Ha filter, I had an immensely satisfying view of the Gum Nebula and surroundings.  Here is an Aladin Finkbeiner layer representation of what I saw, annotated with the major designations.  Also attached is my rough field sketch.  The "cometary" nebula is Sh2-311, and it was quite bright.  The "SC w/N" or star cluster with nebula, is RCW 19 -- in which I noticed a grouping of brighter stars which seemed like an open cluster, but I don't find a designation for one -- though large and loose NGC 2546 is nearby, and I may have thought they were together. 

2) Flat Galaxies from home

Another September night and a little board with doubles, I decided to try out the PVS-14 on Flat Galaxies.  I used Huey's guide and went page by page over several hours for an epic night. I could see almost every one -- through I did skip the faintest ones for later.  It revealed that I can have great deep sky sessions from the worst of skies.  Here's an example: 

UGC 11964 (Pegasus) = MCG 3-56-19 22h 15m 28.8s +19°13'12" 14.5 1.9 x 0.1

Incredibly difficult because of how thin it is, very extremely faint, seen only with averted vision and adjusting the gain, unfiltered, it appears as a tiny sliver of barest of contrast change.  I think I only saw the relatively brighter elongated core region.  NGC 7241, on the other hand, was large and bright in comparison, fairly uniform in brightness but heavily mottled especially its southern half.

1) M27 Dumbbell Nebula outer shell

Having noticed online astro images of M27 showed it has an outer halo, I went looking for it one night in September with my 20-inch f/5 and PVS-14 night vision from home in Fremont, when I couldn't get out to a dark sky site.  It's subtle enough to escape all but the most attentive observing.  With a 3nm Ha filter, it appeared while changing PVS-14's gain from high to low, but once seen I could hold it, adjusting the gain for the best and most contrasty view.  It appeared as a very faint lion's main-like cloud, a faint mottled nebulous contrast change with the rest of the sky.  There was a fainter sky gap in between the cloud and the apple-core shaped Dumbbell nebula proper--giving some sense of separation, but it did feel connected to the main nebula.  The outer halo moved with the scope, so I knew it wasn't a hot-spot in the PVS-14.  It did not make a quite uniform circle around the whole nebula, it was extremely faint on the whole southern side, and brighter on the northern.  This image, while in color and a much closer image scale -- and more detailed -- gives a general idea of what I saw. 

In 2025 I plan to continue with double observations as usual, especially closely separated pairs.  I will refine my night vision set-up by adding a reducer to the Ayers 4-/8-inch combo scope.  And, I have a newly acquired 8-inch f/12 folded refractor I'm itching to have first light of.

Cheers all.

Mark

[Ted Hauter]

Outstanding Mark! Unforgettable.

1. Milky Way at LSA after opening the car door and having some low lying light around created an indescribable layered look for me of the straight over head band of our galaxy.

2. April 8th. My visiting Father showing the eclipse glasses to our garbage man on his route who was stunned by what he was witnessing.

3. Mount Hamilton solar happenings, quad sun-dog, and Lick Refractor after many many years. Also finding one can see Half Dome atop the mountain.

4. Jupiter with new ICE 80A filter, through my TV85? So much for need of aperture,  only out of this world optics.

5. Tie- Meeting famed Starman Don Pensack at Fraizer Mountain with my young son after a downpour and seeing some self discovered asterisms though his 12.5 during huge gathering.

Meeting also famed architect Stephanos Polyzoides after 15 years of trying to get info/opportunities to meet him as caretaker homeowner of the Hale Solar Lab / Huntington Library.

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[Akarsh Simha]

Here are my additions to this thread:

1. [January] Observing the heavy mottling of the Fox Fur Nebula region with a close friend in his 8" telescope, in Coorg in south India

2. [April] Totality with my loved ones at Evening Shade, AR, with Sky & Telescope Contributing Editor Scott Harrington and his brothers hosting the event. What a sight, with the naked-eye prominence to add to it!

3. [May] Sketching the Hockey Stick galaxy at Lake Sonoma

4. [June] A few objects through Lowrey's 48-inch, including VV 59 (which Jimi calls the "Spade") and Arp 72 with its tidal arms and all

5. [July] First light of my 28" at GSSP 2024! I was so delighted by the views and excited for the large aperture. Big thanks to Randy Pufahl, Mark Wagner for their help with wood and metal work.

Can I cheat and add 3 more entries? :-D

6. [August] Taking the 28" out to Tranquility Base, I was pleasantly surprised by the jaw-dropping views of Swan Nebula and Eagle Nebula, and also of the galaxies VV 738.

7. [October] Observing from 14000 feet altitude in the Himalayas, along with experiments with supplemental oxygen. Seeing the Zodiacal Band stretch almost from horizon-to-horizon and make a huge X in the sky with the summer milky way.

8. [November] The tidal tails of NGC 520 with my 18" at Tranquility Base

There's hopefully two more observing runs in 2024, I wonder what will come out of those.

Clear Skies

Akarsh

[matthew marcus]

One of my peak experiences was the same as #7, but from Lake Sonoma some
years ago. With the brightening of the sky there, I doubt that will
ever happen again :-(
mam

On 11/23/2024 3:03 PM, Akarsh Simha wrote:
> Here are my additions to this thread:
>
> 1. [January] Observing the heavy mottling of the Fox Fur Nebula region
> with a close friend in his 8" telescope, in Coorg in south India
>
> 2. [April] Totality with my loved ones at Evening Shade, AR, with Sky &
> Telescope Contributing Editor Scott Harrington and his brothers hosting
> the event. What a sight, with the naked-eye prominence to add to it!

> DiamondRing_TSE2024.jpg.jpeg
> 3. [May] Sketching the Hockey Stick galaxy at Lake Sonoma

> NGC4656_II.jpg
>
> 4. [June] A few objects through Lowrey's 48-inch, including VV 59 (which
> Jimi calls the "Spade") and Arp 72 with its tidal arms and all
>
> 5. [July] First light of my 28" at GSSP 2024! I was so delighted by the
> views and excited for the large aperture. Big thanks to Randy Pufahl,
> Mark Wagner for their help with wood and metal work.

> GSSP2024_28inch_Jimi_Lowrey_Steve_Gottlieb_Howard_Banich_Akarsh_Simha.jpg
>
> Can I cheat and add 3 more entries? :-D
>
> 6. [August] Taking the 28" out to Tranquility Base, I was pleasantly
> surprised by the jaw-dropping views of Swan Nebula and Eagle Nebula, and

> also of the galaxies VV 738 <https://www.deepskyforum.com/
> showthread.php?1199-Object-of-the-Week-September-16-2018-%E2%80%93-VV-738>.

>
> 7. [October] Observing from 14000 feet altitude in the Himalayas, along
> with experiments with supplemental oxygen. Seeing the Zodiacal Band
> stretch almost from horizon-to-horizon and make a huge X in the sky with
> the summer milky way.
>
> 8. [November] The tidal tails of NGC 520 with my 18" at Tranquility Base
>
> There's hopefully two more observing runs in 2024, I wonder what will
> come out of those.
>
> Clear Skies
> Akarsh
>

> --
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> utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>.

[Ted Hauter]

What a year Akarsh! Yes more year to finish strong...

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[Rod Brown]

Thanks to Mark for starting this conversation. Others have talked about their top observations for 2024. "Observations" can have more than one meaning (so apologies in advance for a long post). To begin in the sense of what I learned, here are my top observations for 2024:

Total solar eclipses are always awesome, but best with friends and family. I observed the 2017 eclipse from a field outside Madras, Oregon, with a great friend (I'll refer to him as Astrobuddy here, he can identify himself if he wants) and about 3,000 strangers. Despite spending five days in the heat with no showers, the experience was great, not just totality but the entire week. Everyone was there with a common purpose, and it was fun to share it with such a variety of people. However, my eclipse experience this year was very different. The centerline happened to pass very close to my childhood home, where my stepfather still lives, just outside Lima, Ohio. Back in the day, I saw my first eclipse there, a partial in the spring of 1984. I enjoyed that experience with another great friend a couple weeks after we both graduated from high school. This spring, it took a little convincing, but Astrobuddy and I went against the weather odds and decided to try to see the eclipse in Lima. We were also joined by my high school friend and his family. Fortune smiled upon us, and we beat the odds -- the day before it was cloudy, and the day after it rained, but the day of the eclipse was nearly perfect. Sharing the experience with friends and family was one of my lifetime highlights.

A great eyepiece can change your life. As hinted in the eclipse story above, my interest in astronomy goes way back. Like other science-oriented kids of the 70s, I have hazy memories of one of the later moon landings that took place when I was in kindergarten. Neil Armstrong also grew up about 15 minutes south of where I did, and a museum honoring him was built there while I was growing up. I launched model rockets, had a moon globe and Space Shuttle model in my bedroom, and had a subscription to Astronomy magazine for a while (in the era of the classic white cover with just one picture and the magazine title in serif capital letters). However, in the three-plus decades between the eclipses of 1984 and 2017 I didn't do much related to astronomy other than read occasional books. That began to change in 2021. A friend was selling his little-used Celestron NexStar 8SE with the kit lens set; remembering the orange-tubed beauties from the ads in those 1970s magazines, I bought it. In the next couple years I used it occasionally; I even attended and enjoyed to a couple GSSPs, but never became super devoted to the night sky. That is, until this spring. I happened to be on Craigslist where I saw an ad for a package including an Ethos 21 and 8, a two-inch Tele Vue diagonal, an SCT adapter, and several other filters and accessories. I knew Tele Vue made good stuff, but I had a hard time conceiving of spending so much money on the hobby. The ad stayed up for almost a month while I continued to dither. I eventually showed it to Astrobuddy, who immediately said, "That's a great deal! Buy it, you will not regret it!!" I hemmed and hawed a bit more, but eventually contacted the seller and made the purchase. I set it all up the Celestron a couple nights later and -- WOW!!! Mind completely blown. Worth every penny!! From that moment on, astronomy became a gravitational force sucking in my attention, time, and more than a few dollars, too. But it has also radiated back to me much enjoyment, many thought-provoking experiences, and several new friendships.

Planning my sessions then recording my observations deepens my astronomical experience. Most of you knew that a long time ago, but it took me a while. Those first years with my 8" SCT, I dabbled here and there. I looked at this and that without much forethought and never a real observation plan. and some nights I would peter out, wondering what to look at next. After I got those Tele Vue eyepieces (and a few more), I started reading and planning and recording my observations. And then more reading, planning, observing, recording, and appreciating. With each cycle, my experience and appreciation grows. Since late May, when I started recording, through mid October, when life and weather intervened (alas, I will have no nights of observing in November), I was out 41 nights and recorded 592 observations. Repeat indefinitely.

For me, astronomy is experienced best with a balance of solitary observing and social sharing. Like many of us, I am an introvert at heart, and I love spending time on my own observing the sky, hood over my head and eyepiece, delving into faint galaxy clusters (I also bought an 18" Dob this summer) and thinking about life as I sit in the dark by myself (or stand when pointing above 45 degrees or so). But, after procrastinating for years, this spring I finally joined my local astronomy club (Nevada County Astronomers). Since then, I've enjoyed going out to observe with other members of my club, comparing views and sharing experiences. On our public star party nights, I'm happy to hop to all the old favorites and see people get excited by them (and recruit new club members along the way). I've made a point of going out to observe and meet others even on nights or at sites when or where I know observing conditions will not be ideal. My town (Nevada City) is working on a dark skies ordinance, and I've taken folks out to show them what we are trying to preserve. My regular observing site is the last spot with cell coverage for people who live deeper in the hills, so sometimes folks will stop and ask, "What are you doing?" That view of Saturn gets them every time (as we all know), and it is fun to see their reactions.

Now my best observations of 2024 in the sense of what I saw:

1. The total solar eclipse. It was a full experience, provoking both the eye and mind, if anything appreciated more the second time.
2. The aurora the night of October 7th. I had my first view of an aurora in May. Astrobuddy happened to be visiting and we were able to sit on my deck and enjoy it. I would have cited that date here if it hadn't been far exceeded in October. On my last night at Black Butte Lake, only three of us were still observing, when the red and magenta started and kept shining brightly to the north. It eventually extended a full 360 degrees, faint but there even to the south. Wow!
3. Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS. Such a beauty.
4. Palomar Observatory. I described my experience there in a previous post. The immensity of the telescope along with the architecture of the building and the history of it all still keeps me thinking and dreaming of life on that mountain back then.
5. Seeing the Veil and North America nebulae through filtered binoculars. The Analog Sky demo at GSSP was the first time I really saw them with a wide FOV. Another big wow! (And probably another purchase in my future.)
6. Every night I was out observing, whether I was looking at high magnification through my Dob at a faint galaxy cluster, or peering between clouds with my binoculars or just my eyes at the constellations. I know that is cheating, cheesy, etc. But if you have read this far, you know that I'm still relatively new at this compared to the decades of experience many of you have, and I am still excited by all of it. Reading the posts to this group, I am also happy to see how enthusiastic so many of you are after all those decades, and I know I have many years of observing to look forward to, too. 

My astronomical gratitude this Thanksgiving: I am grateful to have found this passion in late middle age, when I now have the freedom (of time and finances, and a supportive family) to pursue it. I'm thankful and appreciative of all the good folks I have met along the way and old friends who I have shared it with. I know this won't last forever, so I will enjoy it and appreciate it while I can.

Rod