“Hi

Just wondered if anybody had a starter kit telescope for sale or not using anymore for my 2 boys who are very interested in stargazing.
Regards

Lee Austen”

Roll on intelligent lighting – text away!!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16470744

Get ready to Stargaze and find out more at bbc.co.uk/stargazing

Alternatively come along to the event at Basingstoke Astronomical Society at Cliddesden School on 19th January 2012. Starting at 7:00pm there will be a chance to use telescopes and binoculars if it is clear but even if cloudy, there will be things to see and do.

Refreshments are available.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16410025

Perhaps if you find one you could let them know J

An artist’s conception of Kepler-16b

A planet orbiting two suns – the first confirmed alien world of its kind – has been found by Nasa’s Kepler telescope, the US space agency announced.

I would like to extend an invitation to the Annual Meeting of ‘The Astronomer’ which will be held at St. Mary’s Church hall Complex, Goat Lane, Basingstoke on October 8. You do not need to be a subscriber to my magazine and all Society members are most welcome. Details follow:

THE ASTRONOMER, ANNUAL MEETING 2011 OCTOBER 8

Society members are very welcome this year’s ‘TA’ meeting in Basingstoke whether already TA subscribers or non-subscribers.

The speakers and titles are:

• Dr. Christian Knigge: Recent breakthroughs in our understanding of Cataclysmic Variables.

• Paul Hyde: In the Radio – 80 years of developments in Radio Astronomy

• Roger Dymock: Comets – where are they?

• Tony Markham: The Challenge of Observing Meteors and Fireballs visually

• Derrick Ward: Bringing Astronomy and the Public together

• Mark Kidger: Herschel’s History of Star formation in the Universe,

You will notice even your own chairman appears on the list of speakers!

Bookings are open by visiting the TA WWW site at: http://www.theastronomer.org/ and selecting the link to the booking form which can be printed and sent to Guy Hurst with your remittance. (payable to ‘The Astronomer’).

Optionally if anyone included in your booking has not previously subscribed to ‘The Astronomer, they may do so, if they wish, at a special rate of £10 for the first year’s 12 monthly issues and elect to receive colour pdf e-mailed copies or black and white paper versions by post.

As usual this meeting and speaker line-up promises to be a major event on the calendar of astronomical meetings in 2011 and we look forward to seeing you there!

Guy Hurst

http://www.asteroidoccultation.com/2011_09/0914_48_24040.htm

http://www.asteroidoccultation.com/2011_09/0918_2_24051.htm

I encourage you all to monitor these events, as they are of long durations (18 and 33sec), so that CCD time resolution of 1 sec will give good results.

Photometry will be necessary as the magnitude drops are 0.3 in both cases so we must aim for good s/n and get a comparison star in the same field. I leave this to you !

(2) Pallas is exclusively a UK event as the predicted track does not pass over Europe.

It would be a tremendous result if we can get some good chords. All observations will contribute to the result. Predictions can be wrong, so that observers outside the tracks are equally valuable – that includes my location.

TIP: Remember to set your PC clock to UT as accurately as possible so that CCD frame times can be deduced. An internet time service is commonly used to achieve this. I use Dimension 4. Im sure you are all well aware of this aspect Results are dependant on reliable UT of disappearance and reappearance.

Video observers will be familiar with Limovie for photometry of AVI files.

Summary info can be found here http://www.maidenhead-astro.net/astocc/

Please contact me if you have any questions.

I do hope the weather is good.

Best wishes,

Tim

Tim Haymes

ARPS assistant director occultations

Click here for a jump to the BBC story