The Dutch Observatory

I managed to image the sun before clouds rolled in.  Today 7 active regions!!  Some nice prominence activity and the active regions are also expanding.  Compare these images to those from Monday!.  Today a full disk image as well as close ups of AR1274 showing a small c-flare in its center and 1283. 

Today, August 29th, in addition to the three active regions 1277, 1279 and 1281, two huge prominences on the western limb of the sun.  I made a 1/2 hour animation of one of them and caught a C flare while at it.  Overall it seems today that there is a lot of activity around the rim today.  Lots to look for tomorrow

Please click the thumbnail to start the animation

The prom visible on the SW limb is still there and it might even be bigger today. Today a full disk image and closeup of the 1277 1279 groups. 

The Huricane Irene is missing us and we are having a real nice day with clear skies.  AR1271 is about to turn to the “backside” of the sun, but not before I got a last closeup and  AR1277 and 79 form a very nice group.

Still a very nice view of the sun today with  AR1271, 1272, 1274 and 1275 and the very nice filament between the groups.  A full disk image and Closeups of the Active Regions.

The first day back home and having a chance to image the sun.  Today the sun did not appear to be very busy but still some smaller proms, a very nice filament, and four regions AR1271, 72,74, and 75 showed activity.  A full disk image today with closeups of AR1271 and 1272.  Also the scope is again on a tracking mount.  Good to be back home!!

I took my SolarMax40 and a non-tracking mount on our vacation to upstate NY.  Because of our schedule and the weather conditions, I only was able to capure an image of the Sun on 5 days.  Here the images.  Quality is low because of the weather and the non tracking mount.  However 5 images more is better than having none…..

Back from a two week vacation trip to visit relatives in upstate NY.  The weather was terrible.  More than half the days were cloudy and rainy with the nights dropping in the low 60s, high 50s.  But worst of all, I did not have access to the internet.  But we’re back and I will update my sites soon with the images I was able to take.  Also while we were there, I did attend the August meeting of the Mohawk Valley Astronomical Society which was held in Hamilton N.Y. at Colgate University. I could not believe it as I met a  very active member of MVAS, Carol Higgins, who I worked with 35 years ago.  This was a surprise and it was great to meet her again!!

The program included a guided tour through Colgate’s museum of Minerals and Gemstones.  I used to facet gemstones, so this was a double goody for me.  We also learnd about the dinosaur eggs on display in the museum.  Than on to the planetarium where weekly shows are available for Colgate’s visitors.  Joe and Tom, both members of MVAS and working at Colgate gave us a personalized overview of the capabilties of their planetarium and showed several works in progress of the productions of the students at the university.  The planetary show finished with the screening of “The Violent Universe”, a presentation about everything that can go wrong in the Universe that and might lead to the end of our existence on Earth.  A dozen of us than joined Tom to pay a visit to Colgate’s Observatory “The Foggy Bottom”.  Tom explained how the name came about and then it went up in the tower.  The clouds were scattered and we had a 4 day moon in the sky, lighting up everything around us, so the moon became our target.  It was nice to witness the occultation of a star by the dark side of the moon.  Some of us saw the star, others not any more.  A real great evening.  Thank you Mohawk Valley Astronomical Society and Colgate University.

The sunspot groups are still very nice today.  Full of activity.  Made a full disk image and a closeup of AR1260, 61, and 63. 

My first images in Carrington Rotation 2113.  Today a beautiful display of sunspot groups AR1260, 61 and 63 showing some beautiful activity.  I love it imaging such a beautiful display on our star!!