Thoughts from Terry

from the ifas list:

Hi all,

Well, you probably heard the news by now: those optimistic fools, including
me, who went to John o' Groats to see the annular eclipse, were beaten by a
dense fog coming in off the sea. - Trust the wind to be from the East at the
relevant time, rather than the prevailing SW which would have been ideal. Terry
Murphy had set up his telescope, but had to put it away as it was getting so
wet from the fog!

Those a bit further along the N coast at Dunnet Head, including Pat O'Neill &
Lee Gordon, didn't fare any better. Those who went to the NW, near Durness,
including John Flannery, were more lucky, with views of at least large partial
phases, and some of annularity. Sir Patrick Moore said he & Brian May got some
quite good views, including some in the infra-red. There was a Sky at Night
special on Sunday night (which I didn't know about until afterwards, so I
missed it), but he tells me it will be repeated on Saturday morning.

Also, a bit further South, towards Inverness, some views were had of
annularity, even thought it was barely so from there. Oh well, an Annular is only a
special form of partial (hiding my disappointment....). The next one is on 3
October 2005, with the track of annularity running NW to SE across the Iberian
peninsula, crossing Madrid. In Spain it will have a maximum duration of 4m 10s
at Moraira on the Med coast (NE of Benidorm), and nice & high in the sky. An
excuse for a late holiday, I think, even though it is also visible as a large
partial in Ireland (67% in Dublin). It starts not long after sunrise, but the
Sun will be a bit higher up than for the one just past: altitude 10, 19, & 27
degrees from Dublin at the start, middle & end, respectively.

The next is on 29 March 2006, at a mere 18% in Dublin, but that one is a nice
Total Eclipse in N Africa & S Turkey - time to start planning, folks!

The EAAS is holding a special 'Telescope Day' at the Thompson Primary School,
Ballyrobert, on Saturday 7 June, from 10.00 to 16.00.

The Stardome Planetarium will be doing shows as follows, 11am, 12 noon, 2pm,
3pm, and 4pm depending on numbers available. Mark and Nigel Stronge will be
doing three displays called "Astrophotography on a Budget" which will last about
20 minutes each. Ryan Johnston and William Patterson will also be doing three
displays called "The Space Shuttle". These will start on the half hour
starting at 10.30am. in one of the classrooms. These will be power-point and video
presentations and will be very interesting.

There will also be various stands in the marquee by Terry Moseley and the
IAA, the EAAS ourselves, Derek Heatley with his space memorabilia, Andy McCrea of
North Down Telescopes, and Armagh Observatory with John McFarland, hopefully
also Robert Dick although this is uncertain at the moment.

Julie Thompson will be launching her space rockets, always a big attraction
as well as good craic.

Weather permitting there will be telescopes set up outside for viewing the
sun, and Philip Baxter will be giving short 10 minute introductory safety talks
on solar observing, just to be on the safe side!

Good luck for the weather!

Terry Moseley