NBAS 2nd Anniversary!

This month we celebrate our 2nd year with our first “official” public night-time event! On Friday the 26th, we’ll set up telescopes at Greylock Visitor’s Center in Lanesborough (weather permitting), with a lecture on “The History of the Constellations”.

Event at Greylock Visitor’s Center!

Mt. Greylock Visitor’s Center, Lanesborough MA

Join us on Friday the 26th in Lanesborough for our first sponsored public observing event at Mt. Greylock Visitor’s Center, where several members will have their telescopes pointed at popular Fall objects, Saturn (and maybe Neptune?), and the thin crescent Moon. While the scopes are being set up, inside there’s a talk “Mapping the Skies: the History of the Constellations” where we’ll discover how and when our familiar constellations came to be (and a bunch of “ex-“constellations along the way!

Fall is for Open Clusters!

Even though the Summer Milky Way is getting lower in the sky and setting earlier, the Fall Milky Way has much to offer, especially in binoculars and small telescopes!

Stretching from Perseus (with the famous “Double Cluster”) all the way across Cassiopeia, Cepheus, and even Lacerta (with a few more in Andromeda), there are dozens of open clusters to discover! Just scanning from one end to the other (all the way to Deneb) you’re treated to one after another after another, all different sizes, shapes, concentrations, many with nice color contrasts in the brighter stars. The map above just shows a few of the more well known ones:

Binocular Targets:

  • Caldwell 8 (NGC 559) in Cassiopeia
  • Caldwell 10 (NGC 663) the ”Lawnmower Cluster” in Cassiopeia
  • Caldwell 13 (NGC 457) the “Dragonfly Cluster” in Cassiopeia
  • Caldwell 16 (NGC 7243) in Lacerta
  • Collinder 463 the “Queen’s Reflection” in Cassiopeia
  • Messier 52 in Cassiopeia
  • Messier 103 in Cassiopeia
  • NGC 225 the “Sailboat Cluster” in Cassiopeia
  • NGC 654 the “Fuzzy Butterfly Cluster” in Cassiopeia
  • NGC 7160 the “Swimming Alligator Cluster” in Cepheus
  • NGC 7380 the “Wizard Nebula” (and cluster) in Cepheus
  • NGC 7510 the “Dormouse Cluster” in Cepheus
  • NGC 7789 ”Caroline’s Rose Cluster” in Cassiopeia
  • NGC 7790 the “Widow’s Web Cluster” in Cassiopeia

This Month’s Image

Bob Donahue, NBAS

NGC 7331 is the primary galaxy in the “Deer Lick Group” in Pegasus in which a supernova was discovered on 14 July when it was mag 17. It has since brightened to mag 11.9.

This image was taken 19 Jul with an eQuinox2 (4.5”) telescope, 35m exposure, and the estimated magnitude is 13.2.