Society Winter Meeting

 

The ASET Winter Quarterly meeting will be held at 7pm on Saturday, January 8th in room 110 at TJC West RTDC building located at 1530 S SW Loop 323 and W. Robertson Road in Tyler. The main parking is in the NW corner of the campus off Robertson Road. Once inside the door turn right at the vending machines and then left the hall across from the office.

Jimmy Ragsdale of Lufkin will present a program on Astrophotography following the business meeting.

RENDEZVOUS OF A CRESCENT MOON AND VENUS

 Here are some photos of a Crescent Moon and Venus from Tuesday Evening. I couldn't get them download until this morning. A couple show Earthglow. Venus was at it's furthest eastward on Oct. 21th. It reached it's high sky altitude on Nov. 28th and was it brightest last Tuesday, Dec. 7th. (Day of the photos.)

ANOTHER LOOK AT THE NOVEMBER LUNAR ECLIPSE COURTESY OF NASA

 If you missed the Lunar Eclipse from this past month, here is a NASA time lapse video of the event.

18 NOVEMBER 2021 NEAR TOTAL ECLIPSE PHOTOS

 Photos of the near Total Lunar Eclipse on 18 November 2021. This was taken with a Canon camera; not a telescope. There were so dew problems and some photos were over exposed to show Moon-Earth's shadow contacts.

 

ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY OF EAST TEXAS QUARTERLY MEETING, 11 SEPTEMBER 2021

 

The Astronomical Society of East Texas will have it's quarterly meeting on Saturday, September 11th at 7pm at the Discovery Science Place (DSP) Annex, 302 N. Broadway* in Tyler.

 

Jimmy Ragsdale of Lufkin will be doing a presentation on his astrophotography techniques. Check out on of his photos below.

 

The public is invited.

 

*Park between the Annex and the DSP building on the West side of Broadway.

 

FULL BLUE MOON TONIGHT IS A LAST FOR A WHILE

 Tonight's Full Blue Moon is the last Blue Moon for two more years.

PERSEID METEOR SHOWER AT MINEOLA NATURE PRESERVE THURSDAY, AUGUST 12TH

 

The Mineola Nature Preserve in conjunction with the Astronomical Society of East Texas will sponsor a viewing of the Perseids Meteor Shower at the Nature Preserve on Thursday evening, August 12th, from dark until Midnight. The location is the "East" parking lot. So park on the "West" side. The event is free and open to all. You may want to bring either a blanket or reclining lawn chair and, if you have them, binoculars. Telescopes will be available to view other celestial objects also. With respect for the recent weather and the possibility of mosquitoes, bring only repellent wipes-Please no sprays. Also no smoking is allowed. This is a weather permitting event. If the skies are too cloudy, the event will be cancelled. A cancellation notice will be posted on the Society's website: asetexas.org, via this email: info@asetexas.com, and a sign at the Preserve entrance stating "STAR GAZING IS OFF". You can also text to 903-520-7338. Come, relax and look up to see the fiery glows of sand grains and pebble size "meteors" hitting the Earth's atmosphere at 90,000 miles per hour!

STAR GAZING AT MINEOLA NATURE PRESERVE

 

The Mineola Nature Preserve in conjunction with The Astronomical Society of East Texas will present a STAR GAZING at the Mineola Nature Preserve on Friday, August 6th. This is a free program and everyone is invited.  The activity begins about  9:30 PM and will end about 11PM. The location will be the amphitheater next to the pavilion. The program is a group exercise in identifying objects in the night sky that can be seen with binoculars or the naked eye (Naked Eye Astronomy). Try to arrive by 9pm to get acclimated to your surroundings.

This is a weather permitting program.  In the event of inclement weather or cloud cover, the program will be cancelled. A “CANCELLED” notice will be posted in the “Calendar” page of the Society’s website: www.asetexas.org/calendar on the date, view our Facebook page: Astronomical Society of East Texas and a “NO STARGAZING” sign will be posted at the Preserve entrance.

Please keep an eye on the weather and dress appropriately for it.  We have had significant amounts of rain lately, so wear clothing to ward off the mosquitoes.  If you bring mosquito repellant, DO NOT bring aerosol sprays; use wipes instead.

Door prizes will be offered at the end of the program.

For more information on this event and the Society, contact us at info@asetexas.com or text to 903-520-7338.

 IF YOU CAN ARRIVE BY 8:40PM, YOU WILL GET TO SEE THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION PASS OVER ABOUT 8:50PM.

TOTAL LUNAR ECLIPSE, WEDNESDAY, MAY 26TH

 There will be a Total Lunar Eclipse, Wednesday Morning, May 26th beginning at 3:47am at Moon Set. The Moon will be in the SW sky about 25 degree above the horizon. The TOTAL eclipse begins at 6:11am and will reach the maximum at 6:18am. The eclipse will end about 6:21am as the Moon becomes too dim and sets.

QUARTERLY MEETING OF THE ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY OF EAST TEXAS

 

Quarterly Meeting of Astronomical Society of East Texas will be held on Saturday, June 5th at 6:30pm at the Science Discovery Place. The address is 308 N. Broadway Ave. in Tyler Texas.

If you have agenda items or events, please comment them.

CANCELLED !!!!!!!!! SCHOOL NIGHT FOR ASTRONOMY

 

EVENT CANCELLED!!!!!

The Mineola Nature Preserve in conjunction with The Astronomical Society of East Texas  will be presenting SCHOOL NIGHT FOR ASTRONOMY, an astronomical viewing EVENT, at the Mineola Nature Preserve  Pavilion area on Friday, April 30, 2021.

This is open to the public and is especially for all public, private and home school students and their parents. There is no charge.

The program will begin about 5:30pm for sign in for all students. Solar viewing at 6:00pm, until Sunset and  Celestial viewing to follow at approximately 9:30 pm.

This is a weather permitting event. In the event of rain or clouds, the event will be cancelled.  An announcement of cancellation will on our website: www.asetexas.org/calendar  and our  Facebook page: Astronomical Society of East Texas.  There will be a “No Star Gazing “ sign at the preserve entrance. The make-up date would be announced later.

 

FACE MASKS ARE RECOMMENDED AND SOCIAL DISTANCING IS TO BE OBSERVED!

Dress properly for the weather conditions.  Be prepared for Mosquitoes-long pants, long sleeves. NO SPRAY INSECT REPELLENT!

 

For more information on this event, The Preserve and the Society, contact us at info@asetexas.com or text to 903-520-7338. On the web at www.asetexas.org or Facebook: Astronomical Society of East Texas and Mineola Nature Preserve on the Sabine River.

COMET ATLAS MAKES AN APPEARANCE IN APRIL 2021

 

Comet ATLAS in AQUILA on April 8 to April 20th.  It is a magnitude 9.5 comet.  You may need a 8"+ scope to see it. It will be moving into HERCULES at the end of the month.  The comet was discovered by the telescope in Hawaii to searches for Earth impacting asteroids.  Thus the name ATLAS, is an acronym  for ASTEROID TERRESTRIAL-IMPACT LAST ALTER SYSTEM, the system program that found the comet.  The best time to see it is in the predawn sky.  The positions above are at 4am CDT.

Near Earth Asteroid will pass Earth todayl

 

Asteroid Apophis will pass by Earth,. It will be 44X the Moon's distance from us. Unless you have a 12" scope, you will have to strain to look at it.

You can see the event on a couple of webcasts: Slooth.com (currently not functioning correctly) and Virtual Telescope:

https://www.virtualtelescope.eu/.../potentially.../Asteroid

The latter begins in 4hours and 22 minutes.

 

QUARTERLY MEETING OF THE ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY OF EAST TEXAS

We apologize if you could log into the ASET Zoom meeting last Saturday evening. We had some technical issues. We also noticed that there were few participant login in.

If had problems getting online last Saturday, comment to this post or email us at info@asetexas.com. We will explain or provide the correct login information.

So we will regroup and try again at Saturday, February 27th. If you log in before 7pm and you see a screen that says wait until the host lets you in, then you are at the right location. If on that night you're still having difficulties call 903.805.9902.

The meeting ID: 743 8008 5349

Password: aset (all lower case)

 

 Paul Shaw is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: My Meeting
Time: Feb 27, 2021 07:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)
        Feb 27, 2021 07:00 PM
        Aug 7, 2021 07:00 PM
        Nov 6, 2021 07:00 PM
Please download and import the following iCalendar (.ics) files to your calendar system.
Monthly: https://us04web.zoom.us/meeting/upAuf-mopj4pHt1TF8hTmqSsWK0mseacuzEl/ics?icsToken=98tyKu6srTMqGtyQsx2OR7YIA4qgc_TxiCVegrcMqDm9CxReczDlAckSP6F6EdvF

Join Zoom Meeting
https://us04web.zoom.us/j/74380085349?pwd=b1htRE9URTM3aEtjTGd6dHRjOFJtQT09

Meeting ID: 743 8008 5349
Passcode: aset

Seeing the 6th planet from the Sun, Uranus.

 If you have not seen the planet Uranus, then you will have a simple task to see this January 20th. Look in the space (sorry about the pun) between the crescent Moon and Mars. You will need some good binoculars or a small spotting scope or a telescope.  About 2 degrees below Mars (width of your pinky) in a scope or binoculars look for the BLUEISH  star like object about equal distance from the Red Planet and waxing crescent Moon. In the scope it will not twinkle as much as a star. 

****NOTE: 
Well the week,according to weather forecasts, is filled with cloudy weather, thunderstorms and rain. Sorry the 20th is a wet, no go for this event.****