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by Bill Pellerin, HAS president & editor of the GuideStar

by Bill Pellerin, President

HAS Organization Status

Thanks to some legal work, done by HAS member Scott Mitchell, the status of the Houston Astronomical Society as a non-profit educational organization has been confirmed by the State of Texas. This work was in addition to the work done with the Colorado County taxing authority to assure that the organization was not liable for property tax for our observing site. The board of directors greatly appreciates Scott’s contribution of time and expertise on this issue.

The Houston Astronomical Society Election

It’s only July, but it’s probably not too early to be thinking about the 2015 year of the HAS. The nominating committee is obliged by the by-laws to present candidates for the various elected offices of the HAS at the October meeting. This means that it won’t be long before the nominating committee will start calling HAS members to assess their interest in holding one of these elected offices.

You can get a jump on the nominating committee by contacting our VP (Rene Gedaly) and expressing your interest in one of the elected offices. There are 4 officers, 5 board members, and 9 committee leaders to be nominated. Read the by-laws to get the list of elected positions. There’s a link to the by-laws at the bottom of the home page of the HAS web site.

by Bill Pellerin, HAS president & editor of the GuideStar

Object: The Blue Racquetball, NGC6572
Class: Planetary Nebula
Constellation: Ophiucus
Magnitude: 8.1
R.A.: 18 h 12 m 6.4 s
Dec: 06 deg 51 min 12 sec
Size/Spectral: 15"
Distance: 3500 ly
Optics needed: Telescope

A planetary nebula is the near-end-stage of a low mass star, like the Sun. This stage of the star’s life is very short, about 60,000 years, compared to the main sequence stage (billions of years). This one is special because of its color, which, not surprisingly (given its name), is blue.

I saw this object from the Texas Star Party, but it is bright enough for you to see from the HAS observing site. I saw it in a 4” telescope, and you probably have a larger ‘scope than that available to you. You may have to apply high power to the object to see it as something more than a dot in your telescope view. When I saw it, I was sure that the only object that could be at that location in the star field was the planetary.

Another way to confirm a planetary nebula is to use an O-III (Oxygen 3) filter. Either add it to your eyepiece or move it between your eye and the eyepiece. The planetary will shine brightly through the filter, but all the stars in the field will be dimmed.

Observers at TSP with large telescopes report that they see the color blue in the object. I looked at this planetary through a 14” telescope and may have seen color, but colors of nebulous objects are subtle and sometimes the mind plays tricks on us observers. Sometimes we see what we expect to see.

Nevertheless, give this one a look. I was able to see it in my 4” refractor as an almost stellar-sized object at low magnification. I didn’t see the ‘flyers’ that are shown in the accompanying photo towards the top left and the bottom right.

by Bill Pellerin, President

Amelia Goldberg—Meritorious Service Award

HAS member Amelia Goldberg was honored by the Texas Star Party for Meritorious Service to the event over many years. Amelia has been responsible for housing registration for the TSP for many years and has run the registration desk during the event. She also received the designation of ‘Honorary Board Member,’ only the second person every given that recognition. The first was Deborah Byrd (earthsky.org), the founder of the TSP.

Many HAS Members Attend the Texas Star Party

I’m writing this from the Texas Star Party site. We’re just a few days into the event, but I’ve already seen some old friends from other parts of the state / country / world. There are a lot of HAS members who are here as well. Here’s what we’ve had so far…. Sunday night: some observing with some late clouds and road weariness drove observers away from the observing field. Monday night was much better with a few passing clouds from time to time but observers were able to begin the TSP list or the Advanced Observing (Larry Mitchell’s list) and some were out until dawn. Tuesday night — clear dark skies all night. Wednesday night, Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday night — the same. Lots of late nights under the stars.

So far, there are only a few vendors on site (notably Vixen, Celestron, and AstroCards).

Excellent presentations by our Novice and Education chair, Debbie Moran — one was an introduction to amateur astronomy, and the second one was about her eclipse chasing trips. The theme of the evening presentations is a celebration of the McDonald Observatory’s 75th anniversary. There were speakers from UT on 3 nights — Bill Wren talking about the threat of light pollution near the observatory, Rachael Livermore presenting about early galaxies in the universe, and Tom Barnes who talked about the history of the McDonald Observatory.

It got dark late, but the nights are cool (not cold) and comfortable — light jacket weather. The Milky Way rose earlier than TSPs that occur earlier in the year.