Wecome to the Shoals Astronomy Club Blogsite!

Greetings,


The Shoals Astronomy Club was established February 16th, 2006. We at the Shoals Astronomy club are committed to excellence in the Shoals Area in areas related to and of observance of solar system and deep sky objects. This would include:The planets, the Sun, the Moon, and any and all deep sky objects. As a blogsite, site modification and update is limited to Shoals Astronomy Club members only. Residing President and Vice President are as follows: President- Stan Peck, Vice President- Mel Blake, Secretary -Matthew Sherrill, Treasurer (temp), and club photographer - Roy Long, Public Relations Officer #1 - John Viescas, Public Relations Officer #2 - Matthew Sherrill.
The Shoals Astronomy Club is a community project, intended to support Amateur Astronomy in any way in the Shoals (Florence, Muscle Shoals, Sheffield, Tuscumbia) area. Hopefully, those reading the Shoals Astronomy Club blogs will find information relevant, educational and of extreme benefit.
We all hope to further our understandings of Amateur Astronomy and become better acquainted with our Universe.

* As of January, 2008, the Shoals Astronomy Club is now associated with Mel Blake, PhD - Astronomy, at the University of North Alabama. We currently have a link from the University of North Alabama Website, giving us a site of our on: http://www2.una.edu/planetarium/shoalsastro.html. We hope to further our relations with the University of North Alabama in any we can.

** you can contact us at - (256) 335-2516 or email us at http://www.shoalsastronomyclub@gmail.com


With all this in mind, enjoy our Shoals Astronomy Club BlogSite!!!

Shoals Astronomy Club Members at Mike Beck's house, 07/31/08

Here are a few of the members of our club that met on July 31, 2008!

not shown are: Matthew Sherrill, Ray Carpenter, Jason Green, Steve Jenkins, Adam Blacklidge

top row - Paul Daniel, Roy Long, President - Stan Peck
bottom row - John Viescas, Heath Matlock, David Hovater, Vice President - Mel Blake (UNA astronomer), Mike Beck


our members meet each month, last thursday of the month to discuss astronomy and space science related matters. We observe at least once a month as a group as well as individually, and try to support the community with sidewalk astronomy. We are looking for funding from resources and one goal is to educate ourselves and others in any way we can about the universe, whether cosmology, physics, astronomy (solar, lunar, deep sky), and become complete in what we think our individual philosphies, whether it be religion, or universal truths would have us to be.

m17, the Omega Nebula, (horseshoe)

Horseshoe Nebula, M17. In the depths of the dark clouds of dust and molecular gas known as M17, stars continue to form. The nebula is also known as the Omega Nebula, the Swan Nebula, and M17.

The darkness of these molecular clouds results from background starlight being absorbed by thick carbon-based smoke-sized dust. As bright massive stars form, they produce intense and energetic light that slowly boils away the dark shroud. M17, pictured above, is visible with binoculars towards the constellation of Sagittarius, lies 5000 light-years away, and spans 20 light-years across.

(notes from S.A.C. member) - the Horseshoe (omega) nebula, i first really observed in my 13.1" dobsonian mounted newtonian reflector, back in 2007, the spring i believe. I've seen it before, but through a 13 inch telescope.. it is really defined. looks more like a sickle through my telescope. I enjoyed this as much as the lagoon or trifid because of it's unique shape.

Messier Object 7

Messier 7 (M7, NGC 6475) is a large and brilliant group, easily detected with the naked eye. As Burnham describes it, "the cluster is seen projected on a background of numerous faint and distant Milky Way stars."

This splendid cluster was known to Ptolemy, who mentioned it about 130 AD and described it as the "nebula following the sting of Scorpius." The description may also include M6, but this is uncertain. Because of this presumable discovery, the present author [hf] has proposed the name "Ptolemy's Cluster" for M7 some years ago, a proposition which has found some acceptance meanwhile.

M7 was observed by Hodierna before 1654, who counted 30 stars. Edmond Halley listed it as No. 29 in his catalog of southern stars of 1678, and Abbe Lacaille added it to his catalog of southern objects as Lac II.14. Charles Messier included it as No. 7 in his catalog on May 23, 1764.

M7 consists of about 80 stars brighter mag 10 in a field of about 1.3 degrees apparent diameter which at its distance of perhaps 800 light years corresponds to a linear extension of 18 or 20 light years. It was classified as of Trumpler type I,3,m or I,3,r. This group is approaching us at 14 km/sec. The brightest star is a yellow giant (spectral type gG8, mag 5.6), the hottest main sequence star is of spectral type B6 (mag 5.89). M7's age was estimated at 220 million years, both according to the Sky Catalog 2000 and the new calculation of the Geneva Group of G. Meynet. Recent work suggests a slightly larger distance of 1000 light-years, which would increase the size to 25 light-years but would not affect the age.

Ake Wallenquist found that this is one of the clusters with the highest degree of concentration toward the center. Modern sources agree on M7's integrated apparent visual brightness at magnitude 3.3, while older estimates, mostly from northern observers, had this southern cluster significantly underestimated at mag 4.1 to 5.0.

(notes: S.A.C. member - M7 is an awesome object, just one of the many objects you'll find near Scorpius and Sagittarius - it's not the most profound, but one definitely to observe - check out all the M objects in this region... the heart of the milky way is near!!!)