STARGAZING SESSION IN BUSO-BUSO |
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November 22-23, 2003 by Allen Yu and James Kevin Ty Images by James Kevin Ty |
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The November starparty held in the town of Buso-Buso was a trade-off of sorts both to the camaderie of fellow ALPers and the observational side of this gathering. Touch of Glory Prayer Mountain hosted by Bread of Life Ministries through Rev. Alice Villa-Real once again extended its warm and unselfish hospitality to accommodate members of ALP for an evening of gracious dinner and provision of site well dark enough from city lights for any observations made to be of scientific value. ALP welcomed the attendance of Dr. Jett Aguilar, who brought This was almost one of the biggest gathering of ALPers in a starparty.
Though some key members were not able to make it due to personal reasons, It would
be an honor to name those who contributed to the cast that night: James Kevin Ty with his
TV101 apo-flourite refractor on GP-DX mount with SS2000, Henry So and his Orion
Starmax 127mm with Astroview equatorial, Edward Tan with his 6" Orion Dobsonian
reflector, Joel Munoz with his 8" ALPers who were not able to join tonight but we knew their hearts are always with us: Rev. Alicia Villa-Real who simply has to give herself time to rest (from jetlag and hectic schedules), Mr. Alfonso Uy due to some personal reasons, Elena Moya also with personal reasons, Russell Limcangco who has to go back to Bataan for his balikbayan relatives, Oscar Lei still busy with PAWS affairs, and Prof. Edmund Rosales with a busted radiator.
It was quite a while for the group to finish completely the equipment
set-up (delays courtesy of Allen!), then they posted for posterity, taking some 15
minutes. They were treated with various impressions of M45, the Pleiades, under different
types of telescopes. M45 was so far the most decent celestial showcase at that time, as
I’ve noted, haze wrecked havoc on the remaining deepies. James’ TV101 was the
one that brought respect Allen was energy-sapped by midnight, the repeated uphill climb with not-so-light loads has taken its toll on his legs and brought sensation back to his ankle. Before he can lie on his back, he accompanied Mam Rich to comfort room downstairs, and there shared her a small book called The Observer’s Sky Atlas by E. Karkoschka. It’s a handy deep sky map, separated by regions of constellations, and areas in focus magnified further for detailed hunting. She noted a list of Messier objects in the appendix, along with numerous marks and notes, and asked why. Allen explained to her he mark them after he had observed them, but she was quick to reply that every object has been marked! And to think of my unfair advantage over the group in case we had a Messier Marathon! Hehehehe J He had to explain it’s the thrill of discovering and rediscovering that were the reasons for his proposal of Messier Marathon. Its not about winning or losing, its our heart in sports este the sky. So when they went back up, it was still overcast and he hit Joel’s sleeping mat and underwent to semi-alpha state (really!) :) There was a time when Edward was trying to pin down M78, the brightest reflection nebula in the sky in Orion but to no avail. He had been persistent on outdoing himself since the last successful bagging of difficult objects in the last starparty. He wouldn’t just sit back and let Kevin and I do the honor of finding it! Though Kevin and I had join in the manual hunt, still it failed to materialized. They compared with the view they had on Dr. Aguilar’s Nextar 5i, which had graciously found it for us. Not impressive tonight I noted, it has not been this faint. But the magnified manual hunting on Edward’s 6X30 finderscope was of little use, it was simply never easy to pin down the approximate location of an object in the sky, time to graduate to a red dot finder, heh, Edward? J The midnight nap (with Joel, Edward, and Rich) of almost 2 and a half hours left Kevin and Jett chatting, observing whatever is missed by cloudcover, and imaging alone. During the course of lying on Joel’s mat, Joel, Allen and Edward witnessed a "tumbling" bolide cutting across Orion, estimated to about magnitude –7 to –9 (so much brighter than Venus, and almost that of a crescent Moon’s brilliance), with bluegreen train and smoke. "Tumbling" because it seemed to traverse a not-so-smooth direction. Kevin has to be rewarded by his persistence, it seemed he can get Around 3:30 am, they woke up to see an improving sky. Orion and
Sirius now noticeable brighter, transparency has gained about three-folds. M42 looked
better now, but starting to hug the Metro Manila lights in the west. Nevertheless, it
finally offered a clear window to cap the event. Edward noted the reflection of the Big
Dipper on the Joel devoured the southern contellations, Edward identified the False Cross, the asterism sharing two constellations of Vela and Carina. Joel hit on the Eta Carina Nebula, a very rich open star cluster (joel, please supply the details), a rich, small, star cluster with a "hole" in it. 5:00 a.m. Kevin summoned everybody to see an Iridium flare, predicted to shine at magnitude –5! What transpired was a slow moving satellite, barely magnitude +1, crossing the Gemini area! It seemed Kevin has miscalculated the event, he failed to take into account the great distance of Binondo to Boso-boso for the flare to effectively lit the area! He later rechecked the location via Heaven's Above site and it does indicate that it was only a -1 iridium flare. The +1 mag they saw was due to some haze and thin clouds that further dimmed the iridium flare to around +1. The group departed Buso-Buso at 6 a.m with happy memories once again, had breakfast at McDonald’s Katipunan, and each went his/her own way afterwards. They will be looking forward to the December 20-21 event again Buso-Buso with the hope that next time around, they will all be blessed with a magnificent crisp dark sky then!
For more activity images from this report, click here. ============================================ PERSONAL OBSERVATION ACCOUNT OF JOEL MUNOZ: I finally got to try my 8" truss-dob in a dark site this weekend. Having upgraded from my 80mm refractor, I can now say that aperture truly wins. There are trade-offs, of course. The evening began with a cloudy sky so it was apparent that trying to capture Comet Encke was futile. Quite a disappointing, but the other objects I ended up observing more than made up for it. TAURUS – The Pleiades (M45) readily shone thru the haze on ORION – I can see why the Orion Nebula (M42) continues AURIGA – well M36, M37 and M38 in Auriga are familiar friends, all open clusters. M37 is my favorite among the three and the central orange star on this one is the reason why. I used to strain to see this orange star with my refractor but I could readily see it now. CANCER – M44, or the Beehive Cluster, was unmistakable even with the naked eyes. There are some objects that actually look better thru a pair of binoculars than thru a telescope. This is one of them. I used a 10x50’s on this one rather than a scope. PERSEUS – The Double Cluster in Perseus (NGC 884 & 869) is also an all-time favorite of many and views thru a pair of binocs could rival that of thru a telescope. But once again, the large aperture of 8" showed me more stars than I have seen before. LEO – This was the highlight of my session because it was my first time to see galaxies without straining so hard to see (with the exception of Andromeda Galaxy, of course). M95, M96, M105 and NGC 3384 were seen but not as impressive as seeing M66, M65 and NGC 3628 in the same field of view! The first two were on the left side while the unmistakable elongated wisp of NGC 3628 was on the right with a star in the middle of the grouping. I motioned Allen to have a look and I believe I have convinced him that a 2" ep is worth investing! CARINA – dawn was going to be upon us shortly so I was in a frenzy to bag more objects. I showed Allen what I thought was the Jewel Box but I now know that I was mistaken. It was actually IC 2602 or the "Southern Pleiades". Yes, it was similar to its northern counterpart, only dimmer. Visible even with the naked eyes from this blessed dark site was Eta Carinae Nebula. James was the first one who showed this to me a couple of summers back in Binangonan. We used my refractor back then and I asked myself what was so remarkable about that object. Well, to see it now with a much larger aperture has changed my impression. The glow is not as bright as Orion Nebula but the gap between the upper and lower nebulosities makes it oh so interesting! But time was short as dawn was approaching so I had to move on. Last object was NGC 3532, an open cluster that was so rich, my eyepiece was filled with stars to the brim, and I felt I actually drowned in them! COMMENTS – This is the first time I have really taken
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with him his newly bought Nextar 5i, and Stellarview AT1010
refractor acquired from Arch. Joel Munoz. A picnic package (along with tent and food and
drink stuff) completed his provision. Another surprise appearance was Benjamin Aramilla,
once thought forgotten, but well in the shadows of astronomical activities happening since
the beginning of this year. His presence is a great revival in the interest of
skywatching, a biology mentor by profession, he brought with him his big smile; his wits
and friendly impressions will certainly stick to the minds of those who have met him. He
confirmed participation to ALP by signing in this day as an official member. 
home-made truss
type Dobsonian reflector , Dr. Jett Aguilar with his Nextar 5i, & Stellarview AT1010
refractor on Telepod mount and Allen with his Vixen 4" reflector on CG4 equatorial
and completing the manpower: Rich Pijuan, Atty. Rosemarie Gonzales, Ice Ponce, and
Benjamin Aramilla. Hey, that’s a 1:1.43 person to telescope ratio. Talk about
dedication!
Order of the night
was to hunt down Comet Encke from Cygnus/Vulpecula region. But early evening cloudiness
rendered the mission futile. Imaging was also next to impossible. What the previous
stargazing last month failed to deliver, it still fell short tonight. Seeing was supposed
to be a complement from the transparency (hazy!) they had, but according to Dr. Aguilar,
even while observing Saturn near the zenith does not hold a lot of promise. Lack of
transparency failed to bring out the brilliance of stars, Orion was conservative, and so
did the other deep sky objects.. Visual naked-eye magnitude estimate is only about +4 at
best, not better, compared to near mag. +6 last month! A threatening overcast shifted the
group’s energy to casual story telling and under-the-sky lectures by Rich Pijuan
(with her Turn Left at Orion!). 
to the Seven
Sisters, as his oculars encompassed the whole field so the observers can appreciate its
beauty in entirety. Mam Rich, in her first attempt to be an astro artist, drew her first
impression of the M45. A pity that the Andromeda region was not visible tonight. Benjamin
wanted to see galaxies, but persistent cloudiness till 2 a.m. brought him back to bed,
unfortunately, galaxy-starved. 
whatever he wants even under mediocre skies! He
successfully imaged NGC 2024 beside Alnitak! Then hold on to your breath guys, the elusive
Horsehead Nebula! Although Polaris was not visible when he did his alignment, he was able
to get away with some trails but the image is there. He hoped in their next outing ,
he will be able to get a good alignment and image at high res, but for now.... it will
suffice for him and share his images to members as well. His Pleiades image now boasted
the Merope nebula too! Now, is that talent, sheer luck, or simply dedication! What a
leader for ALP! Bringing and inspiring the rest of us to step higher, further!
pond, encouraged
me to image it for aesthetic reasons. Joel began hunting the galaxies of Leo, and what
strucked me was the good definition detail on M65, M66 and NGC 3628, all in the same field
of view! I remembered seeing only M65 and M66, but missing the NGC thing, the 8" has
lorded over my 6" IMHO, t’was like seeing M81 and M82 and another galaxy! 
to be a favorite. Not so impressive at first due to
the haze and unsteady seeing, but the view improved dramatically as the night wore on.
Especially so at around 3am, when most of the clouds had dispersed and the seeing was much
better. The tendrils of M42 extended beyond what I’ve ever seen before and the bright
glow was quite eerie. I definitely saw nebulosity on M43 as well. Again using the 30mm
Widescan accommodated NGC 1980 all the way to NGC 1981 (open clusters) with M42 at the
center. To concentrate on M42 itself, I switched to a zoom eyepiece to increase the
magnification and thereby darkening the background sky. The Trapezium was very crisp but I
could not see more than four stars. This somewhat puzzled me as I saw six stars easily in
the Trapezium during the first light of this telescope a few months back – from the
city with all it’s glare. Either the seeing was exceptionally good that night (same
night that I thought I may have seen the Encke Gap on Saturn, but I may be mistaken), or
my telescope was not collimated well on this evening in Buso-buso. But in and out focus of
a star at high magnification indicated that collimation was quite good, and the six stars
on the Trapezium should be within easy reach of an 8" scope. It was strange, indeed.
out my truss-dob for a spin. I am very
pleased with the light-gathering power and the ease of use. My previous refractor was also
in an altazimuth mount. There is something I find so pleasing about the simplicity of such
a system. It’s drawback however, is when it comes to high-power planetary observing.
This is when I begin to miss my equatorial mount. I find it annoying having to nudge the
scope every few seconds just to keep the object centered. Lastly, it really is better to
prepare a list of objects to observe prior to a session. I came ill-prepared and pretty
much covered the sky haphazardly. I realized now that I could have observed more objects
had I prepared a program. Going thru the charts at home the day after, I realized I missed
certain objects only a few starhops away from objects I observed on that evening. And I
missed them only because I didn’t know they were there! And of course, it would be
nice to do some reading beforehand on the objects just so that you would know what it is
you’re looking at, and what features to look for. Perhaps on the next session, I will
be more prepared.