July Meeting Minutes
July 5, 2006
McCormick Observatory
Attendance: ~25
Guest Speaker: Dr. Ed Murphy (UVA Astronomy Dept.) – Total Eclipse of the Sun March 29, 2006
New Members Gene Chester and Ted Triber
Main presentation
Although the sun is about 400 times larger then the moon it is also much farther away
Reviewed Umbra and Penumbra, what is a annular eclipse and what is a total eclipse. (A good site to read more about these topics are on the Mr Eclipse Web site.
Showed photo from http://www.mreclipse.com
The most favorable conditions yield a shadow diameter of 269 km which travels across the Earth at about 1000 miles per hour which equates to a maximum of 7 minutes of totality under ideal conditions.
A total eclipse occurs only about once every 18 months somewhere in the world.
At any given location on Earth a total eclipse only happens once in every 360 years.
Showed the future eclipses from NASA Eclipse Homepage
World Atlas
of Solar Eclipse Paths
Next major eclipse in US is 2017 August 21….through
Then April 8, 2024….Southern
Next c’ville eclipse is in 2099, September
Last Cville total eclipse was 1478 or 1506.
In other words you have to travel to see a total eclipse.
Showed path of 2006 Mar 29 Eclipse…started in
At its greatest time was about 4 minutes of totality in
Ed saw 3 min 55 sec of total eclipse on a cruise boat out in
the middle of the
Showed video from sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/
AstronomyVacations.com offer eclipse packages. (Although his trip was not purchased through them) There were about a dozen cruise ships that went.
ED went on Costa Cruise line, a middle of the road cruise company
Showed itinerary of trip. Started
leaving from Dullas arrived in
Showed vacation photos of places he visited.
Went to several towns that claimed to be the birthplace of Christopher Columbus.
Showed Rom- in-a day photos.
Then went to
Saw the Pyramids and the Sphinx.
Told the story of the camel ride. Getting on the Camel is free…getting off is about 50 euros.
From
Then on to the
Then to
Went to Turmsous (or is this Termarassos not what city Ed Mentioned or how it is spelled), city height up on a mountain…Alexander the Great did not conquer as it was too high. Huge Greek city high up in the mountains.
They then headed South over the
Out of the 1000 passengers, 800-900 were Americans…the
Europeans just went to
He used the room key which had holes in it a pin hole viewer.
He took the McCormick observatory guys book to the eclipse.
Could only see Venus and Mercury during the totality. Stars were not visible.
The Chesapeake Planetarium took a movie on the cruise…he showed the movie. Lots of screaming in the background
(Not part of Ed’s presentation…but here is a travel log of what seems to have been another passenger on Ed’s Cruise.)
Showed time lapse photography that was taken onboard…temperature dropped about 10 degrees.
Then they went back to
Then back to
Showed aerial photo of
A camera can not capture the inner and outer corona at the same time like the human eye can. None of the photos were anything as good as what the human eye could see.
Bailey's Beads …were not that spectacular…that just depends what craters, moons and valleys, the sun is shining through.
He did not waste time taking photos of the eclipse, as it was his first eclipse and plenty of other people were taking pictures.
The diamond ring effect is far more spectacular in real life then what the pictures capture.
An annular eclipse is worth driving a day to see…a total eclipse is worth traveling across the world to see.
Next total eclipse is Aug 2008 in
2009 Jul 22 will be longest eclipse in our lifetime. From
Other future eclipses:
2010 July 11 south pacific
2012 Nov 13 south pacific.
Club Business
Bill Hobbs won the “Philosophiae Naturalis
Principia Mathematic” by Issac
Newton.
• 55 paid active members
• Checking account: ?
• See Larry Saunders for information on discounted subscriptions to Astronomy and Sky and Telescope
July Observing
•
Saturday, July 22 – Mini Messier
at
• This is also the annual picnic beginning at 5:00 pm
• There will be an open CAS Council meeting at 3:30
Group Nights
scheduled
July 14 – Layman and Saunders
July 28 - ?
Upcoming Speakers
• August: Remey Indebetouw – Infrared Galactic Surveys
• September – Member Show and Tell
• Contact Steve for Suggestions for October and November
Retreat 2006
•
Mark your calendar now for the weekend of August 25 –
27 at Bear Mountain Retreat in
• Email pre-registration began today. Make sure Rich has your name
Heidi Winter gave a great synopsis of the events at Green Bank Star Quest III this year. She also present an Astronomy book that she won as a door prize and donated it to the club library which is located in the basement of McCormick Observatory. Heidi also presented Wes Epperly with a Radio Jove receiver that he won as a door prize at Green Bank but was not there to accept the door prize.
