RAC

At the February Indoor meeting, we were treated to fascinating talk by Dr. Carla Frohlich of the NCSU Astrophysics Department.  The topic was the Origin of Chemical Elements and focused on the various nucleosynthesis processes, especially those occurring in core collapse supernovae, that enriched the early galaxy with all the all heavy elements (elements heavier than helium).

It was a very good night of observing on Friday, January 27th! Conditions were mild (for January) and we had about 21 club members and 12 guests attend. Sky conditions were generally good, but the seeing was bit soft for most of the evening. The temperatures started around 56F and dropped to 36F by the time the last members left the site.

In the January indoor meeting Dr Rachel L. Smith, Director of the Space Observation Laboratory at the Nature  Research Center (NRC) presented an overview of her research into solar system evolution to record setting 70 attendees. She also provided  an overview of the astronomy based laboratory at the new Nature Research Center in downtown Raleigh  (opening in April).

On Thursday evening, almost 20 club members went to the IMAX theater at the Marble’s Kid Museum for a special event which featured food, beverages, and two IMAX shows.  The first was preview of the independent non-profit film called Outside-in and the second was the main IMAX feature called Hubble 3D. This was a monthly event called Martini’s to the Max that the museum offers to the public.

December’s observing session officially started at 7:00PM but the gate was opened before that time.  A few RAC members were already there (Jim DellaPenna had opened the gate) along with some visitors. The night was quite pleasant and the temperature was in the Low to Mid 50’s.  There was a ~5mph breeze coming off of Lake Jordan that made it a little chilly but over all it was still comfortable.

On December 9th, the RAC indoor meeting was a club Social.  We had a pretty good turnout of club members, guests and visitors who enjoyed the many great tasting items provided by the membership.

Approximately 200 people showed up at the Public Star Gaze held at North Cary Park on the evening of November 12th, 2011. Although the forecast was for clear skies, clouds hampered observing much of the night.  However between the over 20 telescopes operated by Raleigh Astronomy Club volunteers, visitors were treated to some great views.

During the November 2011 Indoor Meeting, there were two very special awards presented to Mark and Phyllis Lang for their many years of dedicated service to the Raleigh Astronomy Club. Both Mark and Phyllis have served in both Elected officer and Staff officer roles in the Raleigh Astronomy Club for many years.

Eric Raymer from North Carolina State University gave a terrific introduction to eclipsing binary stars in our November indoor meeting.  The presentation started with the basics of what eclipsing binaries are, how we detect them, and showed some of the latest research going on at NCSU.

On Tuesday November 8th, 2011 asteroid 2005 YU55 which is about the size of an aircraft carrier buzzed the Earth within 201,700 miles (324,600 kilometers).  As a point of reference, our moon is 238,000 miles away!   Even though asteroids of this size pass by Earth frequently, the last time a space rock this large came as close to Earth was in 1976, although astronomers did not know about the flyby at the time.  The next such close flyby will take…