Unexpected Saturn

Unexpected business led me to visit Stephens Memorial Observatory Tuesday night. Since I was there and the sky was nicely clear, I decided to open the dome and do a little observing.

Orion is low in the west these nights and the great nebula (M42) was actually only visible through the bare limbs of the neighbor's trees. The view was splendid, however, and at low magnification, the cloudy expanse took on a fan shape. The stars of the Trapezium were clearly displayed, nestled in the gauze.

Using star Sirius to set R.A., and my notebook computer's The Sky software, I was able to use the telescope's ancient dials to locate the "twin" star clusters M46 and M47 -- not visible to the unaided eye. Declination settings are not visible on the old scope at this time so I had to do some fishing. Still, it was gratifying to be able to get in the right neighborhood using the telescope's century-old devices. The clusters were more attractive through binoculars --a glowing path of cloud across the dark field-- than through the telescope though, at low magnification, M46 filled the eyepiece with diamond-dust stars.

Turning the telescope further east as the Moon was rising, I located Saturn. The ring system is still close to edge-on and opposition took place only a few days earlier (March 22). The planet was crisp and bright and, faintly visible nearby, were some of the Ring World's family of moons. It was a lovely sight. I had my camera with me so tried a few afocal (hand-held, lens-to-eyepiece) shots. At settings: ISO 800, f/8, 1/10 sec., I got a fairly good shot (seen here, cropped to imitate an eyepiece view) that depicts the ring plane's angle and even hints at the rings' shadow on the planetary body. Of course, the moons don't show at all being much too dim by comparison.

I closed up at about 10 PM with the Full Worm Moon rising and drowning out the light-songs of everything nearby. A good night of unexpected astronomy.