Sea Scouts Neighbours Moon and WOW'S in Bray

Our adventure in outreach continued in Bray Co Wicklow last night.
We planned this about six weeks ago in John Murphy's kitchen.

Little did we know how wonderful the sky would be on October 19th.
We were very lucky indeed, and we enjoyed ourselves so much.

At the green in my estate Val Dunne, Michael Murphy, Patricia Carroll, Philip Lardner and myself,set up to share the night sky with Bray Sea Scouts,members of the public, some friends and neighbours.
The children enjoyed the Double Cluster and the moon in Patricia's 8inch dob, she had a queue everytime I looked over.

We had approx 80 people arrive to see a low but very steady moon over The Little Sugar Loaf.


It was an exceptional evening with no clouds at all and a stunning first quarter moon.

The moon was at an altitude of just 13 degrees but we were so so lucky as there was hardly a wobble.

We had a good hour plus of good good moon viewing.I tried out some new eyepieces that were given to me for public outreach "SUPERB"

Rupes Recta,Archimedes, Aristillus, Autolycus looked great.
Montes Apenninus, Mons Huygens, Wolf, Ampere, all those fantastic mountains in that chain. I pointed out the Apollo 15 base and someone wanted to see the moon buggy

Plato toward the end of the moon session when it cleared the terminator was so sketchable. The crater rims were laden with detail, but no time to sketch in a session like this.

Eratosthanes was spectacular,really really dark deep very good view.

The seeing was steady people were WoWed and excited and so so appreciative. The scouts came to attention at the end and presented me with a box of chocolates.
I showed the moon, M57, M45,Double Cluster, Albireo, M13.

Michael showed Uranus, Albireo and M57. I could not thank these astronomers enough for giving up their Friday evening to take part freely in public outreach astronomy in suburbia. David Brannigan arrived to help out and I believe himself and Michael continued to observe in Cloon Wood until the wee small hours.

For the majority of people attending it was their first time to see the moon through a telescope. It is amazing how much joy this can bring to people.
Thanks to Val and Philip for bringing laser pointers to show constellations to the kids.



Sea Scouts and other visitors enjoy Philip Lardner's awesome 20inch dob
Patricia Carroll shows the Double cluster. M 13 was outstanding in Philips scope a real WoW factor.



Sea Scouts see really far in a 20 inch dob



The wonderful first quarter moon gets some attention in my scope



Val Dunne shares the moon with his lovely C8


Some of the crowd enjoy Michael Murphy's 11 inch Nexstar



Michael entertains everyone with his Go To



Stephen and Fidelma Sea Scout Leaders with Dee
This is what a flash does to high viz on a jacket
Thanks to my husband Bernard for taking the photo's and for making the much needed tea and snacks afterwards.

Deirdre Kelleghan
President
Irish Astronomical Society 1937 - 2007
Public Relations Officer IFAS
www.deirdrekelleghan.com/
homepage.eircom.net/~irishas/index.htm
www.irishastronomy.org/

Hey Dee absolutely fabulous thanks for sharing ,put a smile on my face to see all those wee one's having such a good time im glad it turned out so well

Way to go Dee and everyone else. The photos say it all.

I'll have one of those ones in the purple wrapper please...

Dave

Many congratulations to all involved.

Are you planning any more? I'm sure there would be more people out there willing to bring along a scope.

That looks like it was a great night well done great work :lol: :lol:
regards Darren

Nice work IAS!