We all met in O'Connor Square, Tullamore just after 9pm. In attendance were Seanie Morris, David Brannian (Dublin), William Coghlan, Brian Payne, Michael Murphy (Dublin), Leo Daly, and Mark Daly. From the square, we set out for the TAS Site in Clonminch. Telescopes on offer were an LX200 12" (William), a Nexstar 11 GPS 11" (Michael), an LX200 8" (David), a Revelation 12" Dobsonian (Seanie), and some binoculars.
Shortly after getting our respective gears set up, we just took in the sky. Mike Murphy had his laptop to try and find the latest Iridium Flare predictions. Around the same time, Seanie got a call from TAS member David Daly, who was in Sligo for the weekend.
Iridium Flare
David was trying to gauge where Saturn was, and Seanie was trying to explain to him via the mobile phone, when all of a sudden, a very bright flare (22:16hrs) came into view! At around magnitude -3 to -5, it passed below the first star of the Plough (Alkaid), and Seanie exclaimed in surprise at seeing it, At the same time, David saw the same flare pass between Alkaid and Mizar (the handle's binary second star). The flare was also an unpredicted one too. The night got off to a good start!
Galaxies
Many targets of the scopes were galaxies. The TAS 12" Dob was used to hop from galaxy to galaxy in the Leo/Virgo/Coma cluster. Seanie made some sketches at the eyepiece. One target was the Sombrero Galaxy (M104), one which Seanie had not seen before and was able to find with some coaxing by David Brannigan, who had it tracked for a time in his 8".
M101 was also a target. David was able to get it via tracking/allignment, but for a while it was elusive with the 12" Dob. Eventually, it was found. Even being at the zenith, it was a difficult object to find. It is a faint and largely diffuse galaxy. Seeing was not perfect, but was appreciable.
Meteors
There were not many meteors to mention. However, we had just got out of the cars at the Site car park, and were all looking south, when a short, bright 'Leonid' flashed by. Apart from that, there were sporadic meteors here and there. Around 01:40hrs, We noticed a slight rise in activity with 3 meteors following each other in 2 minutes around the zenith in the Ursa Major/Canes Venatici area. But, it successive meteors only numbered about 6 in about 20 minutes.
Other objects worth mentioning were Venus with its obvious Gibbous shape, Saturn riding high with at least Titan beside it, The Pleaides (M45), Orion Nebula (M42), the Leo Triplet, galaxy hopping in Ursa Major, Preasep (Beehive, M44), and the Perseu Double Cluster.
At 02:20hrs, it was decided to pack it in, as it gradually became very cold, and heavier dew was settling down.
Seanie.
Midlands Astronomy Club.
Radio Presenter (Midlands 103), Space Enthusiast, Astronomy Outreach Co-ordinator.
Former IFAS Chairperson and Secretary.
  