Jupiter-20090822 - finally a break!

I got burned by lying, hiding clouds a week ago and a week before that was poor seeing.  So it has been 3 weeks since my last good night on Jupiter.

Finally a break in clouds and good seeing too!  I'd say the whole night's seeing was 6-8/10 and 3/5 transparency.  Rare indeed!

I wasn't diligent enough to catch the Io occultation of Europa.  I missed it by less than 30minutes!  :(   I did get setup and imaged this fine one before the clouds rolled back in.

I missed the occultation but didn't realize until after that the Wesley Impact Spot 2009 was nearing the CM.  I'm not sure I see it....  Is that it in the lower right???  It's nearly gone if I got it at all...

Thanks,

Mike

2009 - June - Skeet

My dad, brother and his girlfriend all came to the DCWC for some skeet before heading to the beach the next day. Hey, better late than never, this was from June. My dad took video that I'll post later!

Astronomy - Planetary - Venus (all years) Gallery

All my Venus photos in RGB or B&W (no UV or IR yet)

RocketFuelDump from 2007-12-12

When I 1st saw this I was thinking wow, what a huge comet, I don't remember hearing about this. I grabbed my binoculars from inside and saw it had moved relative to the stars FAST! Then I wasn't sure what it was. Of course I grabbed the camera and tripod. The result is here. I'm not sure why I didn't post it a year and a half ago?!

Animation of the fuel drifting in the upper atmosphere, note how it moves relative to the stars.

http://maphilli14.webs.com/Astronomy/Phenomena/RocketFuelDump-20071212/1.html

More detail here:

http://www.cloudynights.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/2042248/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/all/vc/1

and here:

http://www.cloudynights.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/2042270/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/all/vc/1

and if anyone has the news release please share!

Jupiter 20090804 - GRS and Wesley Impact Spot

It would have been nice to have the seeing hold as Jupiter dropped in altitude towards the time of the Wesley Impact Spot, but it did not.

The image seems a bit crowded to me, but I thought it would be nice to have a dual view with 3 channel RGB all for comparison.

The spot is REALLY spreading out!

Mike's little acoustic ditty

My July 25th, GRS, Wesley Strike and Io Transit

Does it seem like Jupiter season is in full swing yet? :)

Thanks to Anthony for discovering the impact strike, which I will faithfully call the Wesley Strike of '09 (he'll find more).

Seems to me yesterday morning was magical, something special in the air even drew out my son at 5:30.  He woke on his own I swear!  I did dress him quickly and dragged him outside for some help capturing this one and gave him some stellar 8/10 seeing views of Jupiter.  Seeing was a bit better just before he woke up... more on those later.  For now, here is his and my image!  He pressed the start capture button and drove the scope around!  ;)



Rest of the night and full 2009 season is here: http://maphilli14.multiply.com/photos/album/75/Astronomy_-_Planetary_-_Jupiter_2009

Mike