Jupiter and Saturn Conjunction T minus One Day 12/20/2020

    Tomorrow, Jupiter and Saturn, the two largest planets in our solar system will reach a geometric configuration that will make them appear nearly aligned as seen from Earth.  The spectacular sight will have the two planets only 6 minutes of arc from each other.  That is a distance of roughly 1/5 of the Moons apparent diameter.  Both today and tomorrow were forecast to be 100% overcast.   But after a text from my friend Tim Bresnahan concerning the celestial event, I noticed a break in the clouds which had the possibility revealing the two gas giants.  It took me about 5 minutes to gather and set up camera, lens, lens plate and tripod.  The strip of clear sky exposed the planets for a total of 3 minutes during which I snapped off 34 photos at various exposures. 

 

   In the photo Jupiter being larger and closer appears brighter, while dimmer Saturn's rings give it an elongated shape.  Today the planets were seperated by 8 minutes of arc.

The Gales of November Come Early 11/2/2020

 

  Gales weren't exactly predicted, as the forecast was for winds of only 25-35 mph with occasional gusts over 40. Gales are technically winds in the 39-46 mph range.   What I've found out since moving to the lakefront, is that I can usually get winds about 25 mph higher than what is predicted.  Yesterday even exceeded that, when I had a sustained wind of 68.7 mph and a gust of 82.5 mph.   

  I went through the data on my weather station monitor and found between 3 AM and 8 PM, the wind reached 59.9 mph or higher 121 times. Eight of those times were between 70 and 77 mph and occurred between 7:19 AM and 1:45 PM.   But even those were topped by the category-1 hurricane force gust of 82.5 mph that happened at 11:09 AM.  

  I was a couple of hundred miles from home all day but monitored the conditions by computer and an app on my phone.  It would have been stressful to be here to hear the screaming wind as the roof shingles held on for dear life. I did lose a little patch of shingles but I didn't lose a single tree or even a large limb.

Lake Michigan Waterspout 9/28/2020

 

   Last Monday I spotted my first Lake Michigan waterspout.  I was kind of surprised to see the spout because they usually form when cool air passes over relatively warm water.  There was only a couple of degrees difference between the 63 F water and the 60 F air. 

  Later in the week waterspouts were forecasted to be likely on Lake Michigan but all I saw was an early  morning rainbow on Friday.

NEOWISE Closest Approach 7/23/2020

    Comet NEOWISE had its closest approach to the Sun back on July 3. Since then it has been heading back to the outer solar system but not before making a pass by Earth. On Thursday it reached it closest distance to Earth and I happened to have clear skies.

   

    Below is the center of the Milky Way Galaxy with the planet Jupiter just above the trees.

    The sunsets on Lake Michigan often end with a green flash caused by the atmosphere's layers acting like a prism to make the Sun's image slightly split into the separate spectral colors.  This effect causes blue and green, which have the shortest visible wavelengths, to be the last to disappear over the horizon.

NEOWISE in the Evening Sky 7/16/2020

   Comet NEOWISE has swung around to the evening sky and seems to be holding its brightness as it heads away from the Sun.  Last night I was able to get some photos from the yard.

   As I was taking the above shot from my deck I noticed that the ISS was heading toward the general direction that my camera was pointed.  I tilted the camera to vertical and let the satellite photobomb the comet. 

Comet NEOWISE C/2020F3

     Behold Comet NEOWISE. Not since 1997 when the great Comet Hale-Bopp appeared have I been able observe a comet without optical aid.  That 23 year gap exceeds the typical 10 year gap between great comets.   NEOWISE probably doesn't qualify as great but it does break the drought of prominent naked-eye comets which the northern hemisphere has been mired in.

   Saturday morning I was able to drive up to a location 370' above Lake Michigan to observe and photograph this stunning outer solar system interloper.

      Although this apparition of the comet thus far has favored the early morning hours, it is moving north and west and as of today it is best viewed in the northwest after sunset. Due to gravitational perturbations from the major planets, this visit to the inner solar system will increase the comet's period from 4500 years to 6800 years. You can check it out now or wait until the year 8820. 

Distortion Ship 5/3/2020

   The big lake was creating surreal optical effects with the atmosphere again yesterday morning.
Lake freighter the Kaye Barker was several mile off shore when I noticed that it looked like it was transporting a small lighthouse on its front end.  A few minutes later the lighthouse feature was gone as was the smoke stack toward the back of the ship.

  Below is a photo that shows a truer shape of the Kaye Barker.

Moon, Venus and the Lights Across the Lake 4/26/2020

   In yesterday's post I mentioned that the atmospheric conditions that make the city lights from Sheboygan and Manitowoc, Wisconsin visible from the east shore of Lake Michigan occur a couple of times per year.  That was based on the number of  times that I happen to view them while I drove to work over the past few years. But now that I live on the lake shore and have a relatively dark sky, it seems that the phenomena occurs much more frequently as I saw it two nights in a row.

    As we saw yesterday, the shape-shifting of the sun as it set made it apparent that some atmospheric shenanigans were at hand.  The two lingering bright stripes in the photo below were as bright as the sun had been as it was setting, but this photo was taken 3 minutes after the sun went down.

  The lead group of 40 Starlink launch 7 satellites made a dimmer passage at a lower elevation than they did on Friday.  

Starlink Satellites

Orion to the left, Taurus to the right, flanking the Moon and Venus

Orion and the Moon

The head of Taurus the Bull represented by the 'V', and the Pleiades

Moon and Venus just before they set.

Lights of Wisconsin, As Seen From Michigan 4/25/2020

Sheyboygan is lovely this time of year

    A few times per year from the shores of Lake Michigan atmospheric conditions refract light in such a way as to make the city lights in Wisconsin visible from the Michigan side, 60+  miles away.
  The photo below is toward Manitowoc and they could be radio towers.....

.....or they could be the taillights of a bunch of cars crashed into a bunch of houses

I googled Manitowoc at night and this image resulted

   Should have known some atmospheric funny business was in store when the setting sun couldn't decide if it wanted to set or rise.

  I had taken video of the sunset but when I went to rename all the files in the folder, poof...they all disappeared.  Checked all the folders on the computer but couldn’t find them. Then I  searched the recycle bin but they weren’t there either.  So the remaining photos come from the previous night when similar atmospheric conditions occurred but lack of transparency prevented the city lights from being seen. 

Starlink Light Train 4/24/2020

  Since the middle of last year, Elon Musk's company SpaceX has been launching satellites in groups of 60 with the intention of creating a system which will bring high-speed internet to any location on Earth.  With the satellites all being launched together, they initially form a tight grouping that slowly separates over time as they reach their operational orbits.

   In the first few days the cluster forms what has been referred to as a 'Light Train' as they cross the sky together in a line.  On Wednesday the 7th launch took place and last night they passed over my region.

40 Starlinks rising from the west.

Gaining elevation above the northern horizon.

Heading east.

Disappearing into Earth's shadow.

   Three minutes later the next 20 appeared in the west.  These were dimmer because they were further along in their journey to their higher final operational positions.

   As neat as it was to see the light train, astronomers have serious concerns about how this will effect research and astrophotography when the entire system has been deployed.  Those of you doing the math at home realize that 7 launches of 60 satellites equals 420.  The project calls for 12,000 satellites needed for complete coverage and so far the satellites have been brighter than initially predicted.  After the first launch a black coating was tested to reduce reflectivity and the result was negligible.  Remember the Moon is the color of asphalt and it casts a shadow at night.

Freighter Floating on Air? 4/6/2020

    Early yesterday morning the lake freighter Roger Blough appeared to be floating above Lake Michigan as it passed by yard. I don't think it was a Fata Morgana, an optical illusion that usually results in a severely distorted image because it is an inverted image of an inverted image. I think my photo just depicts the ship surrounded in a haze that makes the water the same color of the background sky.

   Another nerdy thing seen from the yard the other day was the International Space Station having a favorable pass over west Michigan last Friday.  I was able to get a few photos with my 500mm lens plus a 1.4x teleconverter.

Venus and the Stars of Winter 3/1/2020

  Last night after a windy and overcast winter I took advantage of first clear moonless night of spring to get some parting shots of the winter stars as they sink lower in the west each evening.  In the photo above Sirius the Dog Star, is the bright one on the left, the constellation Orion is toward the middle to the upper left of the peak of my house and the orangish star to the upper right of the peak is Aldebaran the eye of Taurus the Bull. In a couple of weeks they will be lost in evening twilight not to been seen in a dark sky again until August or September when they'll rise before the morning dawn.

  You may have noticed the jet sneaking into the frame as a streak of light emerging from behind the house peak.  Jets weren't the only things interfering with my astrophotography attempts.  The photo below shows another jet and two satellites.

Jet on left, stable satellite in the middle and a tumbling satellite on the right

   The changing brightness from not visible to bright as Venus is indication the satellite that left the dashed line is tumbling out of control with a period of about 5 seconds. 

  In the photo above, the light paths were cropped  (and in the case of the tumbler, rotated for composition purposes) to show the differences in the light trails they leave.

    Venus was bright enough to cast a shadow and did a admirable job lighting up the lake during the 30 second photo below.