Shetland Astronomical Society

Observing Sessions for 2010

AGM on 20 March 2010
from 2pm to 4pm Venue : Shetland Museum

Discussion : Dall Kirkham Telescope, Membership fees etc.
Election of Committee Members
Also the new SAS telescopes wil be on display- (12" and 5")

27 March 7pm to 9pm at the Shetland Museum
Various Telescopes available - Public - everyone most welcome !

24 April 7pm to 9pm at the Shetland Museum Auditorium
Event :Prof. John Brown Astronomer Royal for Scotland talks about Black Holes , Black Magic and Interstellar travel .

Year 2009
We recently hosted two Autumn lectures at the Shetland Museum on 24 October (with Dr Frazer Pearce - Nottingham University) and 21 November (Dr John Baruch -Bradford University).
Can be found under Images.

We also held a Star Gazing evening at Asta Golf Cub on 13 December 2009

21 November 2009

On 21 November the Society hosted an event with Dr John Baruch at Shetland Museum and Archives. Unfortunately, the planned Moonwatch was not possible due to bad weather. There were, however, models of space probes on display and Chris Brown brought astrophotos along for visitors and members to look at.

John Baruch gave an informative presentation about the moon, discussing lunar and solar eclipses and the relative movement of sun, earth and moon.

John went on to discuss future moon landing missions and the possibility of spending holidays on the moon in the not too distant future. There was a discussion on where and how hotels might be built on the moon and which sports would be best suited for a possible 'lunar olympics'. Lunar swimming was definitely favourite as it would be the same as swimming on earth - the moon also has water available! There were a great many questions asked - and answered.

The event was well attended and it was an informative and enjoyable evening, despite the bad weather.

Thank you to everyone who attended and helped to make the evening such a success.

John was our last speaker for this year and brings our Moonwatch activities to a close. We hope to organise other public lectures in the near future.

13 December 2009

The club held a star gazing evening at the Asta Golf Club. As usual, we didn't get a chance to see the stars, as the sky was completely clouded over... We did have an informative evening though.

Chris Brown showed us his latest astrophotos. He had used the two cloudless night last week to produce impressive results with his DSLR camera and just one minute's exposure time! He told us that the equipment set up and subsequent processing took much longer... Chris let us into a few of his secrets as to how he arrives at the results and gave tips on how to fnd the North America and California nebulas. He also showed off his new cut-off gloves with two incomplete fingers for more comfortable camera operation in cold weather! (Chris McGinley went one better - his gloves are more advanced, with three fingers free!)

Next, Chris McGinley introduced Celestia and Stellarium software. Both are free to download from the net - please see the software section of our website for links.

Mike and Reg brought along card models of various NASA / ESA probes and landers with brief information about each. The newest model is the Lunar Ranger 9, which was used by NASA to take photos of the lunar surface in preparation for the Apollo moon landings. Mike hopes to include some models of Russian space probes at future events.

This was the last SAS event in 2009.

Thanks to everyone for your support at all events this year.

(The SAS Team)

Further information on these events can be found in the Picture Gallery under Events.

Information on forthcoming Shetland events will be posted here .