Observing the Crescent Nebula

The dark skies of Pie Town, New Mexico allowed me to have one of (if not the best) visual observing experiences of my life. While my colleague, Muir Evenden and I were installing the Astronomical Telescope for Educational Outreach (ATEO) in the mountains of western New Mexico, we had the chance to do a few nights of visual observing.

One of the staff members at SkyPi Remote Observatories, Michael, was generous enough to invite us to his home not far from the observatory to observe through his 20" Obsession Dobsonian Telescope. The views through this fine instrument complemented by the dark clear skies along with his 2" Nagler eyepieces were simply breathtaking. I could go on in this post about every single object I observed in detail due to how amazing they all looked. However, I wanted to share my experience with observing a new object for the first time... NGC 6888, otherwise known as the "Crescent Nebula".

NGC 6888 - The "Crescent Nebula in Cygnus - T.A. Rector (NRAO/AUI/NSF and NOAO/AURA/NSF).

After Michael showed me the Veil Nebula through his telescope, he asked me if I wanted to look at the Crescent Nebula in the constellation of Cygnus. I have read and seen images regarding this object, however, I have never actually observed it. After Michael slewed the telescope to the object, I climbed the ladder to take a glimpse and I was truly speechless! Michael had an Oxygen III filter (which is a necessity for this object) attached to the eyepiece that allowed me to see the emission nebula in detail very much like the image above. Michael said some of his guest observers will say "it looks like an ear".

The Crescent Nebula is about 5000 light-years away from Earth. It was discovered by Friedrich Wilhelm Herschel in 1792. It is formed by the fast stellar wind from the Wolf-Rayet star WR 136 colliding with and energizing the slower-moving wind ejected by the star when it became a red giant around 250,000 to 400,000 years ago. The result of the collision is a shell and two shock waves, one moving outward and one moving inward. The inward-moving shock wave heats the stellar wind to X-ray-emitting temperatures.

After observing this object, I have added it to the list of deep-sky objects to image through the ATEO when it goes online within the next few weeks. We have an Oxygen III filter in the filter wheel attached to the telescope.

A special thank you to Michael from SkyPi Online Observatories for introducing this fine object to me! It brought back great memories of what it was like looking at deep-sky objects through a telescope for the first time.

Source: Wikipedia - Crescent Nebula

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"Hey Rocky - Watch Me Pull an Asteroid Out of My Hat!"

In Feb of 2012, Earth collided with a 65ft. in diameter asteroid, which exploded over the Russian town of Chelyabinsk. We all know the fortunate outcome there--they were extremely lucky, in that, the sonic boom, created by the disintegrating rock (at a height of 15 miles as it careened through our atmosphere toward the ground at 45,000 miles per hour), caused thousands of injuries, partially demolished buildings and shattered windows. Had the asteroid entered the atmosphere at a steeper angle, the results would have been catastrophic.

This is the trail of the Chelyabinsk asteroid which exploded about 14 miles above the ground
with a force nearly 30 times more powerful than the Hiroshima atomic bomb in 2013.
Credit: Neuromainker via YouTube/Screenshot by Irene Klotz for Discovery News.

And we never saw it coming. This meteor snuck right upon us from the direction of the sun, out of sight in the blinding light of day, as if some celestial magician had pulled it out of a hat--then threw it at us.

But, guess what? There's more to this celestial magic act...  

Let's start here...

This past April, Earth's orbit intersected the orbit of an asteroid debris field--the debris train, left in the wake of an orbiting, cometary, or, asteroidal body. This particular field is several times the Earth's diameter, and we were right in the thick of it for the entire month of April, as well as the end of March and the beginning of June. Earth's atmosphere encounters this field, and others somewhat like it, on occasion, every April, which, due to the pull of gravity produces 'fireballs' (unusually bright) and 'bolides' (exploding) meteors. But, parts of the field have been increasing in density over time.

Astonishingly, we've had 16 near-misses by asteroids, since January of this year, some within just a quarter of the distance to the moon, and one, actually, at an altitude of less than our GPS satellites! Most of these objects were just a few meters across, with the exception of one, which was a few kilometers in diameter!

So, is this kind of thing common? Could we experience another collision, similar to the Chelyabinsk event?

Well, it isn't a matter of, "If". Rather--I'm afraid--it's a matter of "When". And, that's not just an 'alarmist'' opinion, either; here's the deal:

Space--particularly interplanetary space--is not, entirely, empty. At any given time, there is an assortment of asteroidal and cometary debris surrounding the Earth, and in its orbital path around the Sun. Most of this debris is particulate. But, the process of the formation of our solar system, left behind a wide range of sizes of fragmented rock and iron. In our immediate neighborhood, there are asteroids composed of this material ranging in size from bits of dust, to rocks---to boulders---to school buses---even to 5-story apartment buildings! The Chelyabinsk meteorite was the size of the latter. And, there are a few asteroids out there--- the size of small moons!

On an average day, Earth's atmosphere encounters two basketball-sized asteroids. In any two-week period, we get slammed, by one SUV-sized asteroid. Some burn up, entirely in the atmosphere--and, some, make it to the ground.

In the early days after the formation of our solar system, there was much more of this material, which ended up on the surfaces of Earth and the moon and other planets. Here on Earth, the processes of weathering and erosion have erased most of the evidence for those impacts. However, there is plenty of left-over for orbital physics to play with.

Earth--and, ourselves--are moving through space, on our annual revolution around "Sol", our star--our sun (counterclockwise, viewed from the Sun's North Pole), at a speed of 33,000 mph. At the same time, we're rotating on our axis, eastward, at a speed of 1,000 mph.

Here's a very fitting analogy: We're driving down the freeway, blindfolded--with the pedal to the floor; eventually, we're going to crash---unless we can prevent it from happening, altogether, with an early detection/warning and response system.

Become a member of the NASA Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS), a program that keeps track of these objects by monitoring and plotting their positions, trajectories, and velocities. You could--literally--save the world.

**The title, some of you may remember, is a take-off on the 60's cartoon style, "Rocky and His Friends" ("Bulwinkle" was, undoubtedly, his closest!).

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ATEO Feeling at Home at SkyPi

After a 3 day long excursion across the country, the staff of Insight Observatory has delivered its Astronomical Telescope for Educational Outreach (ATEO) to its new home in Pie Town, New Mexico. The 16" f/3.75 Dream Aerospace Systems astrograph has been successfully installed in SkyPi Online Observatory's pod known as Gamma. When we arrived were greeted by SkyPi's Managing Member, John Evelan. We received a tour of the grounds and were introduced to the other imaging telescopes hosted by SkyPi.

John of SkyPi and Muir of Insight Observatory installing the 16" Primary Mirror.

Because of our week-long stay at SkyPi for the telescope installation, we were able to experience the dark and crystal-clear skies that this corner of New Mexico has to offer. We were also fortunate to be able to look thru a 20" Dobsonian telescope at the spring and summer objects that frankly took our breath away... The consensus was that these were some of the best views of objects like the Lagoon Nebula, the Veil Nebula, and others that we had never seen before such as the Crescent Nebula in Cygnus. Our deepest thanks to our host, Michael, a staff member of SkyPi, who was generous enough to share his telescope and time with us!

We planned for a full week at the remote observatory site which allowed us to take our time unloading, installing, and configuring the telescope. As we tested the components of the setup, we realized there were improvements that could be made to the focuser. Fortunately, SkyPi has resources in the surrounding area such as a talented machinist who was able to modify the focuser so it would perform with better precision. We were also able to configure all of the networking parameters to allow the public to access the telescope.

Michael of SkyPi Preparing the 16" Mirror for Installation.

This is an important milestone for the ATEO, but our work is not done yet; testing and configuration of the scope needs to be performed and completed, completion of the first iteration of our software has to be released, and other sundries that although minor is still important for success. All in all, we are excited and relieved to finally have the ATEO equipment delivered and installed at SkyPi, and now the real work begins!

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