11 replies to this topic

[Dazmaster75]

Stargazing live

This could either be brilliant or awful, totally depending on the weather. The reason for doing this is a culmination of a few astronomical delights over a few days, the main being the partial solar eclipse on the morning of the 4th Jan and the Quadrantid meteor shower.

The Quadrantids wil probably be 2011's best meteor shower of the year with anywhere between 60 and 120 meteors per hour over the night of the 3rd Jan. Moonless skies will provide excellent viewing! Look north towards Ursa Major and Bootes to see the meteors.

[crepuscular ray]

Dazmaster75, on 29 December 2010 - 20:46 , said:

Stargazing live

This could either be brilliant or awful, totally depending on the weather. The reason for doing this is a culmination of a few astronomical delights over a few days, the main being the partial solar eclipse on the morning of the 4th Jan and the Quadrantid meteor shower.

The Quadrantids wil probably be 2011's best meteor shower of the year with anywhere between 60 and 120 meteors per hour over the night of the 3rd Jan. Moonless skies will provide excellent viewing! Look north towards Ursa Major and Bootes to see the meteors.

The north-west of England in January? I hope they've got access to other sources of images. Plus, why Jonathan Ross?

[Sunset_Twilight]

I am looking forward to watching this..

http://news.bbc.co.u...000/9304993.stm

From the 3 January 2011 the BBC will be gazing up to the skies searching for the stars.

Professor Brian Cox and Dara O'Brian will be on BBC Two for three nights looking through a telescope and taking a crash course of the skies.

Throughout the week they will be showing viewers what to look out for.

BBC Radio Sheffield's Rony Robinson will also be exploring the subject from 3 January.

As we prepare for an exciting month, Sheffield amateur Astronomer, James O'Neill explains what we should be looking out for in South Yorkshire…

[Calum]

yep i'm also looking forward to watching this aswell . Also hoping the weather plays ball so i can look up at the stars myself

from the bbc website :
Jupiter viewable 2000 - 2100
Uranus viewable 2000-2100
Saturn viewable 0600
Taurus viewable each day
Pole Star viewable each day
Andromeda viewable each day

Jupiter should be quite hard to miss in the early evening , high in the south. Although you'll need binoculars at least to see uranus.

Edited by Calum, 30 December 2010 - 11:42 .

[Osbourne One-Nil]

Or a mirror.

[Summer of 95]

Would be nice to see some of the eclipse; of the last 5 solar eclipses visible from Britain I've only managed to see one, that of May 2003- the others were all cloudy, including August 1999 down in Devon.

That's another reason to want the cold weather back- it brought the most wonderful starry nights.

[Dazmaster75]

So far the weather is set to clear up and become colder by Sunday, so fingers crossed

[snow raven]

crepuscular ray, on 29 December 2010 - 21:58 , said:

The north-west of England in January? I hope they've got access to other sources of images. Plus, why Jonathan Ross?

Where's Jonathan Ross in the article, or am I being my usual thick self?

Osbourne One-Nil, on 30 December 2010 - 15:04 , said:

Or a mirror.

Classic OON!!

[crepuscular ray]

snow raven, on 30 December 2010 - 23:05 , said:

Where's Jonathan Ross in the article, or am I being my usual thick self?

Not in that article, but in other pre-publicity; they're apparently hoping to teach him to become an amateur astronomer in 3 days. I thought he'd left the BBC. Sigh.

[Jane Louise]

Looking forward to this! I hope we get clear skies really need to try and learn how to use my Telescope.I've only just learnt to see the moon through it lol.

[willkani]

what time will the peak of the meteor shower be?


EDIT: 02.21 am and its cloudy :-(

Edited by willkani, 04 January 2011 - 02:21 .

[Calum]

saw one Quandrantid at 6.55am while out looking at Saturn. Was faint and came from overhead (Ursa Major) and went towards the SW