Observing Notesfrom the Tuckahoe IrregularsI was at Tuckahoe last night with about ten others, including Don, Doug, Lyle, and some others from our group, plus a few people from the D.C. side of the Bay. My 12-volt battery is discharged, as am I, so I won't be able to join you tonight. Viewing last night varied between average and very good as long as your subject was higher than about 35 degrees above the horizon. The upper atmosphere was extremely stable, making for good views of double stars and of Mars once it was high enough. But low-level moisture (i.e., fog) was thick enough to overcome all but the most vigorous of dew-controlling devices. My three heating strips kept all of my optics dry except for my eyepieces; after midnight, any of my Pentaxes that I left in the telescope for more than about ten minutes became opaque. The sky was a bit milky from humidity, and I used my Orion Skyglow filter to advantage when looking at the gassy nebulae in Saggitarius. Very faint objects like some of the NGC globulars in Ophiuchus were indiscernable unless you had eyes like an eagle's -- or like Doug's! :-) We were graced with two passes of the International Space Station (magnitude 0 to -1) and two Iridium flares (-4 and -6, I think) during the evening. And the mosquitoes were thick enough to seemingly affect limiting visual magnitude. Yes, bring your bug shirt -- your Kevlar one -- if you are going to Tuckahoe tonight! :-) Steve |