RAC

A few dozen people gathered at the December indoor meeting to see and hear about various members’ newest astronomical toys. Items shared with the group ranged from books to telescopes to various observing and imaging gadgets. The discussion was accompanied by refreshments which added a festive tone to the meeting. Co-chairman Ian Hewitt also shared a few items of business related to the upcoming Astronomy Days event at the Museum on January 26-27.

If you ever had any questions about the observing lists or even what they are, this was the meeting to attend.  Brian Reasor explained about the Raleigh Astronomy club and the Astronomy League lists.  He went over many resources and even had props.  He went over practical issues.  There was a great deal of interest among club members and a lot of useful suggestions.  It was a good meeting.

On Saturday, October 20th, RAC held a public observing session at one of Raleigh’s newest parks, the Annie Wilkerson Nature Preserve. Over 75 members of the public came out to enjoy the night skies despite the cloud cover.

Seven members went out to Big Woods for some observing on Friday, October 19. Field conditions were ok – just a little damp and the moon washed out the western sky til 9:30ish but everyone worked around it and there were decent skies by 10:30. Brian Reasor did some list work and sky touring and most everyone else was imaging. The last members left about 1:30 in the morning. One of the big hits was that there was lots of…

The clear weather of fall is back! A large group of amatuer astronomers came out to the Big Woods site on Friday October 12 with approximately 27 people present. There were many good fall objects to be seen and there was a decent passage of the space station early in the evening, followed by simultaneous Iridium flares of magnitudes -3.5 and -5.8. The last observer left by 1 AM.

The presentation by Matt Lochansky explained the steps used to do spectroscopy, basic theory, what a person could do using spectroscopy, limitations, resources, equipment, data processing, and show some of the interesting objects in our sky.  Matt had many examples to help illustrate his points.  The presentation was a good one and it generated a lot of questions.