Stargazing Report

 STARGAZING SESSION UP-NISMED

February 20, 2004

Text and Images by James Kevin Ty

 

The first year celebration of the National Astronomy Week040220-a.jpg (41035 bytes) by ALP was held last Friday, February 20th in cooperation with UP-NISMED through the efforts of Edmund Rosales.  He set an open house observation session not only for the ALPers but as well as for the public alike.

Despite the cloudiness that hamper the sky that night, Edmund still open up the observatory dome and used the 16" Cassegrain telescope together with its 8" guidescope to let the viewers and visitors have some good views of the planets.

First on the list was the setting Venus, then Edmund aimed the telescope to the magnificent ring planet Saturn and behold!  The image of Saturn was crisp and a long queue started with the ALPers as well as the guest waiting for their turn to view this wonderful planet.  There were more than 100 visitors who come and go that night so the event can still be called a success despite the villain clouds trying to ruin the night in vain.

040220-e.jpg (35055 bytes)As the hours goes by and the clouds in the sky then started to break up thus letting the visitors get a good chance to see more objects aside from Saturn.  Edmund then switch the scope towards M42, the magnificent Orion Nebula in the constellation of Orion. There were ooh and ahhhs that can be heard from the visitors who look at this diffuse nebula as lots of wisps of details can be seen from the eyepiece field of view!

Next in line was the giant Jupiter!  The gas giant was a bit high already above the eastern horizon that time to give a very good favorable view of the Jovian planet together with its bright 4 Jovian moons namely Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. There was again a long queue as the visitors eagerly await their turn at the eyepiece.

At around 10:30pm, Edmund pointed the telescope to the2nd brightest star in the sky Canopus.  The view was dazzling as the star shows lots of sparkling colors that visitors were also awed by its beauty.  After the clouds started to roll in again, Edmund call it a night with the visitors happily going home with some good smile on their faces.

ALPers then posed for posterity with the observatory telescope and eagerly awaits tomorrow's closing ceremony of NAW with an overnight stargazing session at Buso-Buso, Antipolo.

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For more images of this event, click here.

 

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©2003, 2004  Astronomical League of the Philippines Inc.