We had a fabulous night of observing!

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Astronomical Observing at Fishcreek - Friday 05/15/2009

Tonight, we have a Moonless night until it rises at 1:47am.  We'll be able to see Saturn, colorful double stars, and open clusters made up of hundreds of stars.  The globular clusters comprised of hundreds of thousands of stars, planetary nebula formed by dying stars, diffuse nebula and emission nebula where stars are being born, and galaxies.  Saturn, the ringed planet, is a beautiful sight.  With a high-power view through the telescopes, the cloud bands are now visible since the rings are nearly edge-on this entire year.  Try to catch the rings now, or as soon as possible, because they'll continue to be more difficult to see as the year progresses becoming invisible to us by early September.

   for a list of DeepSky Objects that will be available to us this session.

We hope to see you here for a night under the stars - now in our fourteenth year!

For observing conditions at our site, please click on the link below: 
ClearSkyClock for Fishcreek Site  (the darker blue the squares are, the better)

Quick links:
    Inner Solar System     Outer Solar System    General Information about our events

Moon data   Rises: 1: 47am May 16 Transits: 7: 02am May 16 - Time of highest position in the sky, due South Sets: 12: 24pm May 16 Constellation:   Capricornus Phase:   61.61% illuminated (waning gibbous) Distance:   0.00272143 AU = 407,120 km = 252,973 miles = 1.36 light-seconds Magnitude:   -10.5 Apparent size:   29.34 arcminutes in angular diameter Elongation from Sun:   103.27° (evening sky) Age:   20.93 days since last New Moon Next Phase:   Third Quarter on Sunday May 17, 2009 at 3:26am Next Lunar eclipse:   Total eclipse (100%) on Sunday Sept 27, 2015 at 10:10pm EDT On 5/15/2009 at 9:48:08pm the Moon will be 44.4º below the east-northeast horizon but will look like this when it clears the trees to the east at 3:30am Saturday... Note: All graphics are correct-image representations.  A telescope will reverse this left-right and possibly invert up-down depending on type of equipment being used. (back to 'Quick Links')

Saturn data   Rises: 2: 24pm Transits: 8: 58pm - Time of highest position in the sky, due South Sets: 3: 31am May 16 Constellation:   Leo Phase:   99.74% illuminated Distance:   9.0198093 AU = 1,349,344,265 km = 838,443,665 miles = 1.25 light-hours Magnitude:   0.8 Apparent size:   18.43 arcseconds in angular diameter Elongation from Sun:   109.55° (evening sky) On 5/15/2009 at 9:48:08pm Saturn will be 54.9º above the south horizon and will look like this... Note: All graphics are correct-image representations.  A telescope will reverse this left-right and possibly invert up-down depending on type of equipment being used. (back to 'Quick Links')

Inner Solar System - the Sun, Mercury, Venus and Earth
(Created using Software Bisque's TheSky software)

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Outer Solar System - the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto
(Created using Software Bisque's TheSky software)


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General Information you should know about our events - Q&A of Where, When and What


Very sincerely yours,
Dave Jessie
Time spent observing the heavens is not deducted from your life span

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