💾 Archived View for koyu.space › mrael2_obsv › sessions › 2018 › 2018-06-02.gmi captured on 2023-07-10 at 14:21:47. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
⬅️ Previous capture (2022-06-03)
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Date: 2018-06-02
Time: 10:00 PM - 12:00 midnight
Seeing: II - III
Transparency: 6
Object: M83 in Hya
This galaxy at 139x was surprisingly interesting due to its relatively large size and brightness. I glimpsed hints of spiral structure and would imagine that further detail would be apparent with a larger aperture. Nice for a galaxy.
Object: M5 in Ser
This globular cluster was stunning! It was nicely defined and brilliant, and it deserves additional inspection on a better night.
Tonight was windy and slightly cold with worse seeing than the cloudless sky would suggest. A storm is forecast for tomorrow, and recent fires in northern NM and Durango, CO have made the skies a bit murky, especially near the horizon.
Object: NGC 5139 in Cen
Due to the smoke from the Ute Park fire in NM, this normally wonderful globular cluster was muted at 84x, appearing to be a large, bright nebulous galaxy instead of a cluster of suns. Pleasant nevertheless.
Object: M92 in Her
This is another nice globular cluster. It's smaller than M5 and less brilliant, but its high position provided nice contrast at 139x.
Object: M13 in Her
Magnificent as usual!
Object: M102 in Dra (which is really NGC 5866)
I can see why Messier did not really encounter this object in the same way as others. The galaxy at 139x is unimpressive, small, and dim. Blech.
Object: M101 in UMa
Too dim to be useful in my 10" Newtonian. I should stop observing this.
Object: La Superba in CVn
This red supergiant is also known as Y CVn. I definitely detected the red color, but the star was small and dim. Not being at all versed in estimating magnitudes, I'm not sure if the star was at the dim end of its variable magnitude range. It's worth observing again to detect changes.
Object: NGC 7000 (with 7x50 binoculars)
The North American Nebula remains elusive and unobserved, but I got much closer to identifying the nebulosity with binoculars due to the wide field that my Fujinon 7x50s provide. With the 10" reflector, the distinction between the nebulosity and the surrounding dark sky is lost. I could not orient myself quickly amid the myriad stars, and the view faded quickly as the moon rose near midnight. I'll try again.
Object: Saturn and Jupiter
Some of the worst planetary seeing I've ever encountered made these planets very blurry at 277x.