Whitby & District Astronomical Society

Early weather forecasts for the Hooks house event initially looked rather unfavourable, however, predicted heavy showers failed to materialise and by late afternoon it looked more likely skies would clear and so it proved. 

It was not though the balmy conditions we had enjoyed just a week earlier for the bank holiday, the northern air mass brought with it a decided chill, the kind that a warm padded coat only alleviated.

Having already dropped off a couple of telescopes at Hook’s house during the afternoon, there was enough additional transport on hand in the evening (Barbara and Mark and Lee) to ferry over the remaining instruments and personnel to the campsite, where we were joined by Paul Wood and his daughter as well as Paul Cass.

Having set up the equipment on the adjacent field to the main campsite, the six scopes deployed, including the LX 200 complete with new hand controller, keith’s GOTO dobsonian, the two ‘non goto’ dobs already left on site, together with John L’s scope, Lee’s reflector and Paul woods scope, all made for an impressive, array.  Certainly enough aperture to fully exploit the transparent skies.  The campsite was almost full, and once word filtered around the field, a decent sized crowd began to gather behind the instruments.

The two main visible planets; Saturn and Jupiter, were naturally our first targets, both showing detail not apparent from the West Cliff.  It came as no surprise that people were bowled over by the vista, after all, who tires of the rings of Saturn?  One major difference from the previous week, when the observing location had been from the west cliff, was the superb appearance of deep sky objects.  Little scrutiny was required through the eyepiece to appreciate the selected deep sky wonders.  The Ring Nebula, Dumbbell, M13, M31, the double cluster, M11, M92, M5, M15, et al, all were so much brighter.  Perhaps best of all was the unmistakable soft glow of the Milky Way, which could be traced from horizon to horizon with the , dark the northern rift in Cygnus, clearly evident.

Several laser point tours were conducted, with constellation recognition made so much easier by the dark conditions.  By 22:15h, some two hours after the first views of Jupiter, the chill finally began to take its toll thinning out the crowd to the die-hards and late-comers.  It had been a rewarding and satisfying evening much appreciated by the campers.  Here’s looking forward to next year.

This event was requested over a year ago by the Women’s Institute, but the actual composition and likely format it would follow only emerged on the day itself.  In other words the weather decided what was possible on the evening, and although the heavy rain which fell for much of the afternoon had ceased, it was still cloudy!

Plan B was therefore an indoor presentation at their meeting venue, but as this was the main hall of the Whitby Pavilion, it did add another dimension to what was possible.

On arrival Mark and Keith were given a warm welcome by Heather and Mandy in the hall and given time to ‘set up’ the equipment and demonstration aids whilst the ladies saw to WI business for the evening.

Utilising the size of the hall, and with aid from WI members, various scale demonstrations of planetary solar system and stellar distances were performed with much encouragement from the side lines

Following a tea break, in which several rather delicious slices of home baked cake were consumed, our various examples of meteorite and tektites were passed around before Mark a gave a short (for him) power point presentation on the various types of wondrous objects astronomers observe. 

We only overran for 5 minutes.  It was an enjoyable evening and from later feedback, much appreciated by the WI members, with a few expressing an interest in perhaps joining the WDAS.

This is part of the Dark Sky festival involving all the North York Moors dark sky sites.

We will be hosting the event for Danby Moors Centre on November 2^nd.  The public book to attend the event, but places at the Danby Moors Centre are limited to 60.  The event is due to start at 18:30h and therefore we are looking to be on site by 18:00h (setting off no later than 17:45h).

Personnel and transportation is therefore requested, as we would like to field 6-8 scopes dependant on the weather.  Plan B is always waiting in the wings, ie a presentation indoors.  Should the forecast be so awful, the event will be cancelled- though we shall have to wait until a few days before to make sense of the forecasts.