A screening of “Nostalgia for the Light” will be on Saturday 2nd February at around 11.50am as part of a Latin American Film Weekend at Chancellors Hotel & Conference Centre in Manchester. The film is a documentary about the astronomers who work at the telescopes in the Atacama Desert in Chile. Part of the film includes footage of people looking for loved ones who were disappeared by the Pinochet regime and buried in the desert. To see the details of the film go to Nostalgia for the Light . by Rodger King #Flim #Chile

A special meeting in the Wincham Community Centre on Thursday 27th December @ 7pm to 9pm Talk is about D.A.R.T. the earths defence system by Professor Richardson from Maryland university USA. He has offered to give this special presentation whilst he is visiting parents for Xmas Look forward to seeing there. by Ged Birbeck #DART

This is a simple video representing the relative sizes of the planets in our solar system. https://youtu.be/eB32ykkiJk8 by Unknown ADAS member #Video #SolarSystem #Planets

A transit of Mercury from the HLCO site on Monday 19th May. by Unknown ADAS member #Mercury #Transit #HLCO #AstroPhotos

Report from St. Martin’s Isles of Scilly darkest and clearest sky I’ve seen. 6"Reflector and 15 x70 Bins Saturday 11th September Half hour walk back from pub meal under clear sky to horizon Milky Way wonderful!! (Too tired after overnight journey to Penzance to observe) Monday 13th September Very clear between showers, too windy for telescope. 15 x70 bins, 22: 30 -23:35, M51 best I’ve ever seen it, M101, M13, M31. Noss 2-2, 22:20-26, bins and naked eye. Tuesday 14th September 6", Windy, 22:30 - 23:45. Searched for Toutatis (asteroid 4179) 40mm 2x converter, but wind was too strong to confirm whether I saw it. Friday17th and Saturday 18th September Last chance to observe. 21:00 to 00:35 21:05 ISS naked eye 67 degrees North. Flare 21:46 Pegasus -5 Mag. 22:35-00:50 TOUTATIS 6"R 40mm 2x converter near Kappa Cap +4.73 23:05 Looked at other things till 0:20 to see how much it had moved. 15x70 bins M51, M101, M71, M27, M13, M92, M31, M15, M33 (impressive) and for the first time M74 and M30 by John T #Galaxy #MilkyWay #GlobularCluster

This year ADAS attended the Timperley Country Fair on Saturday 21st September. The event had been cancelled last year which dented our funds a little bit. This year the sun shone for most of it and we had a wonderful and profitable day. As in previous years we had our reliable tombola stall, manned chiefly by Colin Steele and Paul Clark as the normally ever-present Ged was unable to make it. Don was running his Lunar Lucky Dip and Chris was running the Lucky6 game which was first tried earlier this year at Gatley. This triple-pronged attack, once again, proved very successful for us and we raised about £200 for the society's funds after all the expenses were paid. It might have been a little more had Don not sold out completely before 2 O'clock. The photo on the right (click it for a larger view) shows the ADAS stall with Don, Chris and Colin toting for business. Graham & Pauline, Tony, Graham S and Paul missed out on the photo but were there helping out. by Unknown ADAS member #TimperleyFair #Fundraising

The Elan Valley complex of reservoirs can be found ~ 40 kms east of Aberystwyth and 4 mls SW of Rhayader. Wednesday 8 September NELM 6.5 Borg 101ED f6.2 refractor 31 and 13 mm TeleVue Nagler eyepieces OIII and UHC filters. This is the darkest location that I have experienced in the UK. By a road in a N-S valley the Milky Way blazed overhead from horizon to horizon. M8 in Sagittarius was clearly visible naked eye low to the south. There was no visible light pollution. This helped by an eastern aspect partly obscured by a long ridge of hills. M13 was an ‘easy’ naked eye object as was M33 later. Using the 31mm eyepiece to give x20 magnification I cruised the stunning star fields and nebulae (bright and dark) from Sagittarius to Perseus. A special recommendation goes to the area around the Double Cluster. These 2 combine with Stock 2 to give a magnificent view. Applying an OIII filter also brought out the very large but not bright nebulae of ICs 1848, 1805, 1795 and NGC 896. Numerous stars embedded in great swirls of diffuse nebulosity. I could also revel in a first view of the M31 area through the Borg. A novel experience was watching M33 rising above a sharply delineated hill top. So near and so far! Another couple of faint ticks were NGC 7320 the brightest component of Stephan’s Quintet at mag 12.5 in Pegasus and IC 1295 a mag. 12.7 planetary adjacent to the globular NGC 6712 in Scutum. After some sleep in the back of the car it took a couple of hours to drive home. by Unknown ADAS member #DoubleCluster #Nebula #GlobularCluster #PlanetaryNebula

From Friday 16th to Monday 19th July it was perfectly clear all night for 4 nights. Saturday 17th was even clearer? A sunset green flash was seen over La Palma. NELM ~7. My observing location was at 2000m on Mt. Tiede. I used a Borg 101ED f6.4 refractor with 31 and 13 mm Naglers and x2 Televue Barlow. Mounted on a heavy duty Manfrotto photographic tripod I steered using a red dot unit power finder and photocopies of the Milky Way areas from Sky Atlas 2000. Words cannot express the majesty of the naked eye Milky Way from a dark southern location. The wide field views possible with the scope provided a porthole into the darkest depths of our galaxy. Dusty, dark nebulae abound. A true sense of the structure and nature of our galactic home became apparent. Globular clusters provide good targets for small telescopes owing to their high surface brightness. I observed about 45 down to mag 11 scattered around our galactic centre. Open clusters are ‘stars’ in this scope. Pinpoints of light scattered against velvety black backgrounds. Normally elusive bright nebulae could be picked up against the contrasting dark (!) background sky. Galaxies, not the best for small apertures, were detailed! The Whirlpool and M83 both exhibited spiral structure. Amazing in a 4” scope! The finale at 01:00 on the Monday was an epic journey along and across the southern galactic border of the dark rift splitting the Milky Way. Starting at M7, I travelled past and through the Sagittarius star cloud, around the Lagoon, over M24, through the Scutum star cloud and on and on to the North American in Cygnus. A stupendous voyage! by Paul #Galaxy #OpenCluster #Nebula #MilkyWay

Friday 13th July with lucky CLEAR skies. Don (with the Critchley Meade), Warren and Mike (with Mike’s 10” Dobsonian, 15x80s and Short tube 80 refractor), Colin (with bins.) and Paul (with the 20x100s and his OMC 140) gathered at Teggs Nose at about 11pm on Friday 13th.  The sky was clear and became surprisingly dark. This was the first session for some time for four of us.  It became cool and very pleasant.  The first target was Comet LINEAR 2001/A2.  Soon found in all the instruments (Don managing with the Meade after I’d given up with the small finderscope).  This became an impressive sight in Pegasus as the night became darker, shining at about mag. 5 with a large coma and tail to about 1 degree..  Colin and I were also convinced we could see it with the nakedly by about 1 am. After browsing around for a while I became very surprised at the darkness and clarity of the sky and started to work on some Herschel 400 objects low down in Ophiuchus.  Initially I had a great deal of success picking off globulars and planetaries (the Box and Little Gem nebulae) in between ‘rests’ with the brighter Messiers. Colin did a few variable estimates including delta Scorpii however, his efforts to photograph the comet were frustrated when a cloud bank passed through at a critical time. Meanwhile Warren and Mike were getting some very impressive views with the 10” Dobsonian.  The Dumbbell and Ring Nebulae were excellent, an OIII filter greatly enhanced the contrast between these objects and the darkened background sky. The Milky Way became brighter and could be followed down as far south as the Small Sagittarius Star Cloud (M24). This tempted me to go for some more objects lower down in Sagittarius.  Half an hour of ‘failure’ followed.  No new objects but some excellent views of the brighter Messier objects.  The globulars M22 and M28, the Lagoon, Triffid and Swan nebulae. During this time I missed some bright meteors and Iridium flares… My view of the night was through the 10” with an OIII filter.  Mike called me over to see ‘something’.  This turned out to be the Swan Nebula (also known as the Omega nebula or M17).  The view was the best I’d had and when the filter was added revealed great filamentary detail as well as the obvious Swan shape. The rising last quarter Moon washed out an attempt to find the Veil Nebula in Cygnus and brought a halt to the proceedings at about 1:45.  It was great to be out again under the stars. Paul Clark. by Unknown ADAS member #MilkyWay #GlobularCluster #Nebula #Comet

I (Paul Clark) was observing from Gradbach on Sunday night. At 00:00 UT the comet was easily visible to the naked-eye with direct vision. It looked like a 'half Andromeda galaxy'. Visibility through the Telrad making it easy to point the 'scope. A bright nucleus gradated out to a ~17' coma. A straight tail was visible for about ~60' and very marked on 'jogging' the telescope. Conditions were very good. The Sagittarius star cloud being visible low in the south. by Paul Clark #Comet #GradbachHill

What a small world! The picture below was e-mailed by Eckart Suntheim. Pauline Cliff and Graham were looking at the southern skies from the bar at the Kingdom Hotel, Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe with Eckart and talking digital video tecnology. The picture Eckart has sent seems to suggest he is well on top of technique. Graham C' picture set from Zimbabwe is at present too big to fit the remaining space on the web site. by Unknown ADAS member #SolarEclipse #AstroPhoto

27th December 2005 18:30-23:00 Llyn Brenig, NELM 6+. Telescope - Obsession 18” f4.5 dobsonian Eyepieces – 31 and 13mm Naglers, 24mm Panoptic OIII and H beta filters. First off, a horizon to horizon crisp and frosty Milky Way. The faint and unimpressive comet C/2005 E2 McNaught at mag 10ish was seen down in Capricornus. Some interesting galaxies lie to the west of Pegasus, including NGC 7241 a nice pale edge-on spiral. A failed attempt on a planetary in Cassiopeia resulted in a great sweep of some very interesting open clusters inhabiting the region towards Cepheus. Berks, Czerniks, Frolovs and Kings were seen alongside the usual NGCs and Messiers. PK 122-4.1 a mag 14 Planetary Nebula was found in this area. Abell 2 and the local group galaxy IC10 were also found nearby Schedar. Dropping off from the point of Triangulum resulted in a great find of a pair of galaxies, NGC 672 and IC1727, recommended for large scopes. NGC 784 is a nearby edge-on sliver. A wallow in the splendour of NGC 891 was followed by some ticks of faint fuzzies that had been missed in previous years. UGC1841 (mag 13.5) and 1837 (mag. 15) are recommended. An obscure gem is NGC 1579 a Bright Nebula in Auriga, this has an interesting dark lane and is quite bright. Put it on the list. Swinging east of Polaris I ran through some bright mag 13 galaxies. The Horsehead was very pleasing with the 24mm Panoptic and H beta filter. Magical M33 finished off the session. by Paul #Galaxy #Nebula #LlynBrenig #MilkyWay #OpenCluster #Comet

In our meeting on 7th March the skies cleared and most of the 40 members went into the car park to look through the two large goto telescopes we had set up. Members could look at the moon, Jupiter and an array of stars in the night sky. Several newer members were treated to a short explanation of how to find the pole or North star by Karin Rodgers…to be honest some of the older members also learned something too. The easiest method for finding the North Star is by finding the ‘Plough’, an easy to identify group of seven stars. It is known as the ‘Big Dipper’ to the Americans and the ‘saucepan’ to many others. Next you find the ‘pointer’ stars, these are the two stars that a liquid would run off if you tipped up your ‘saucepan’. The North Star will always be five times the distance between these two pointers in the direction that they point (up away from the pan). True north lies directly under this star. The ‘Plough’ rotates anti-clockwise about the North Star, so it will sometimes appear on its side or even upside down. However its relationship with the North Star never changes and it will always dependably point the way to it. The reason the North Star is so important for natural navigation is that it sits directly over the North Pole. Something that people often forget is that whenever you are trying to find true north, you are actually trying to find the direction of the North Pole from wherever you are – even if you are only heading a few hundred metres on a gentle walk – ‘north’ is still just an abbreviation for ‘towards the North Pole’. by Unknown ADAS member #Polaris #Plough #UrsaMajor

Comet C/2012 S1 (ISON) is now visible in the morning skies before dawn – and after a little outburst in brightness, many people have reported that it is now just visible to the unaided eye, and should continue to brighten over the next ten days as it approaches its perihelion at just 1 solar diameter from the surface of the Sun. Here is a video showing you where and when to look for Comet ISON, and discussing how bright it might get. The temperature at its closest point may exceed 2000K, and the tidal forces on the comet will be very high – both of which mean that there is a chance that Comet ISON’s first visit into the inner solar system might well be its last. If ISON survives, then there’s every chance that it could be visible to most northern hemisphere observers to the unaided eye in the first week or two of December 2013 in both the morning and evening – although morning apparitions will be more favourable. Comet ISON is not the only comet around at the moment. Comet C/2013 R1 (Lovejoy) is also potentially naked-eye visible in Ursa Major, and the periodic comet 2P/Encke may also approach naked-eye visibility briefly. Both of these comets will also be visible in the same region of sky as ISON at different times – see the video above. There are potentially 2 other comets which are visible in binoculars: Comet C/2012 X1 (LINEAR) brightened unexpectedly by over 100 times in October, and now sits just 1º from the bright star Arcturus, and comet C/2013 V3 (Nevski), discovered only a few days ago, has also experienced an outburst and is around magnitude 9 in Leo. So fingers crossed that we get to see ISON. The big problem may be the age-old problem for astronomers in the UK… the weather! by Richard Bullock #WhatToWatch #Comet #Video

This meeting was held at 8pm Wednesday 26th July. The main lecture was by Jonathon Shanklin, director of the BAA comet section (Jonathon was co-discoverer of the hole in the ozone layer in his day job with the Antarctic Survey - true!). Chester's meeting hall GPS was +53degs 12.07mins N, -2degs 52.34mins W, which was a church hall that is now being refurbished. You can contact Richard Sargent of Chester AS, through NWGAS, to get the address of the new meeting place. by Unknown ADAS member #ChesterAS #Meeting #Comet

This is a talk given on Friday 1st November by one of the society’s members Chris Suddick. The talk takes a historical and present day look at how the universe was first measured and how this approach has led us to understanding more about the universe. by Unknown ADAS member #Video #Universe If you are interested in meeting Chris or listening to other talks and presentations then why not come to one of our meetings? You can find details of all our speakers here and to contact us go here.

Much debate on the ADAS@YAHOO news group about the fireball seen late Saturday night. Some think it was a NASA satellite re-entry others a real fireball. According to Richard B a real fireball landed in a "garden in Bavaria"! The composite below shows some of the observers and the Comet again from Saturday, with the Comet view including the horizon, Andromeda and Mum, Cassiopeia. This is a big file - 80k, but what the heck!? Film Fuji 800 ASA ROKKOR 35 mm F2.8 lens and 30 secs exposure. by Unknown ADAS member #FireBall #Comet #Discovery

Last weekend various ADAS members were at the BBC's 'All Night Star Party' to commemorate Mars' closest proximity to the Earth in 67,000 years. People from other societies throughout the north - west were present, displaying various astronomical oddities, such as a pair of binoculars (?) made from a pair of 6'' F8 refractors, skillfully lashed together, or Paul's 'extra lightweight' 10' dob, or an 8'' F3 spider-less newtonian, with the secondary being mounted on a flat glass plate, at the front of the scope. The Isaac Newton 2.3metre scope in La Palma was ours for the night, as it were, and was taking requests from viewers and visitors. (well into the night for the visitors) Roger L was pictured at the start of the programme, stuffing his face with food, and Paul C was given a short slot to demonstrate his 10-incher to everyone. One startling fact also became apparent as the night went on, and that was I noticed that the 250m. Lovell Radio Telescope actually moves more quietly than an LX200. It truly whispered along it's tracks, barely audible. OOPS! nearly forgot to mention there was a photography competition as well - Phil Masding and Mark Crossley both took prizes, Mark's webcam image of Jupiter was commended as being particularly good - nice one Mark, I don't like completely hate you at all or anything, but poor me didn't even get a mention for my efforts :-( by Unknown ADAS member #JodrellBank #Jupiter

Geoff (6" Dob) NickD (8" ADAS Meade) Chris (Miyauchi 20x77 binoculars) and myself spent a lovely three hours stargazing from one of our local dark sky sites. The sky was slightly hazy with a limiting magnitude of +4. I could easily make out Cr 399 and the Scutum Star cloud with the naked eye. The seeing was excellent ANTII but unfortunately it was breezy. I spent most of the time hunting down faint globular's and planetary nebulae through my 12" and 24 Pan. Whilst the others just had a look around the sky. I particularly like Geoff's 6" dob. It is a very neat well made telescope with excellent optics. Below is a brief account of what I saw. Globular Clusters M13 in Hercules. It was very nice to compare the view of M13 through Nick and Geoff's telescopes. I think that Geoff's image of M13 was probably one of the best views I have seen in a telescope of this aperture. It appeared small, round and granular. Through my 12"M13was a glowing ball of star light. Visible through my 12" were the globular's M14 M10 M12 Ophiuchus NGC 6760 Aquila NGC 6934 Delphinus and M15 Pegasus. M14 M10 and M12were resolved and appeared as gra iny balls of star light. M15, because it is brighter and bigger was clear and bright with many stars visible almost to its core. NGC 6760 and 6934 were difficult globular's to resolve because of there size and magnitude. Both appeared as tiny and slightly granular balls of star light. You need high power to see resolve them into individual stars. Planetary Nebulae I also had a look at some small planetary nebulae. I had a look at the show piece objects M57 and M27. But also some of the lesser known ones. NGC 6572 Ophiuchus NGC 6803 Aquila NGC 7009 Aquarius and the Cats eye nebula in Draco. We all had a look at Neptune and Uranus. They appeared as tiny round fuzz balls in my 12" and the ADAS Meade. Towards midnight we started to see a number of Persid meteors. Which were bright and slow. Lets hope it is clear next Wednesday for the peak. by Paul Brierley #PlanetaryNebula #GlobularCluster #MeteorShower

Please remember that looking directly at the Sun WILL damage your eyes. If you wish to look at the Sun during an eclipse there are certain precautions you can take. However there is no totally safe method for looking directly at the Sun for a prolonged period. Click here for some basic guidelines on safety. Please note we will be selling mylar eclipse 'shades' (to a CE standard) at our meeting dedicated to eclipse observing (June 4th). The last eclipse visible in England was the eclipse of 1927 which crossed Wales, Lancashire and Yorkshire. In case you are wondering where is the best place to watch the eclipse,  some industrious person has already done all the hard work for you. The best place is in Iraq!  If you are going to be watching the eclipse from the U.K. (poor thing), then you need to be in the "Toe of Cornwall". Falmouth is almost on the centre track and there is talk of the police trying to stop people going (something about public order). Just remind them that you have the right to travel freely and unhindered on the Queen's highway. For those venturing further afield, the most accessible locations will be in Northern Europe, particularly France and Western Germany. For those with a real wonderlust, here is the entire European eclipse track. The maximum duration of the eclipse is near the Black Sea.    Members below ready and eager to  see the eclipse in August!! If it is cloudy, wet, stormy or snow bound etc. where you are and you cannot observe the Sun then look at  Mees White Light Telescope.   Daily images are maintained for your convenience. The picture below shows Dr. Colin Steele (L) and Dr. Don Utton (R) with Chair(man) Chris Suddick after the entertaining society meeting concerned with the forthcoming August eclipse. Don has the highly technical colander shadow machine and Colin has the probability chart of cloud cover! ( These appear elsewhere on our web site as does the eclipse 98 photo-insert). CCD Solar Images Don Utton and Roger Livermore are combining forces to get CCD pictures of the Sun. Don has provided high quality mylar filter medium and Roger the CCD and the time and effort to get the pictures! His first CCD solar effort is below, much sharpened and contrast enhanced but at least the sunspots can be seen on a day that was filled with rolling cloud (that's CLOUD not ROCK!). The picture right is their most recent attempt. Better with no cloud and greater magnification. Well done chaps. by Unknown ADAS member #Eclipse #Sun