Wiltshire Astronomical Society Posts

Due to the continuing COVID19 lockdown, our May meeting tonight, Tuesday 5th May 2020, will be held “online” only, using the software Zoom. Our speaker, long-time friend of the society Martin Griffiths, is kindly accomodating us and will give his talk “The Habitable Zone – What is it and How is it determined” over zoom remotely.

Andy Burns has successfully wrestled the technology to the ground and will “host” the Zoom meeting which he aims to start at 19:45. The online meeting details are as follows:

• Meeting URL: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82646358305?pwd=aWJUcTBkdmZsMGx2QUVwc2pxaUpCZz09
• Meeting ID: 826 4635 8305​
• Password: 666948​

The society will post further information here (as well as the usual email and facebook channels) about the June meeting when the situation becomes clearer.

Tonight, Tuesday 3rd March 2020, we will be welcoming astrophotograher Dr Lilian Hobbs who will be talking to us about the Armchair Messier Marathon, as is the season.

This month’s newsletter, penned by Andy Burns (thanks Andy!), highlights the issue of the new low earth orbit mega-constellations that are causing concern for ground based astronomers, amongst other local updates and information.

Andy also led the society’s outreach efforts with visits to local schools and Scout groups, thanks again.

Also, check out the Group photo taken by Peter at the last meeting.

Tonight, Tuesday 4th February 2020, we’ll be entertained by Jon Gale, as he walks us through observing the mighty Herschel 400.

This month’s newsletter, as always, has been ably complied by Andy Burns (many thanks Andy!) and can be downloaded the link below. Special thanks to Andy Burns and fellow volunteers for the schools outreach events that happened this month.

Greetings and happy new year!

Tonight, Tuesday 7th January 2020, we’ll be hosting the annual beginners forum. This meeting will have no speaker and gives a chance for members to ask questions and learn from other members in the society. If you are attending, feel free to come armed with queries and you’re welcome to bring your equipment too if you can technical questions.

This month’s newsletter, as always has been ably complied by Andy Burns (many thanks Andy!) and can be downloaded the link below.

Tonight, Tuesday 3rd December 2019, we’re looking forward to welcoming Dr Dirk Froebrich, from the University of Kent, to our December festival monthly meeting.

Dr Froebrich will be talking about his involvement in the citizen science HOYS-CAPS Project. The project aims to allow amateur astronomers to assist with long term photometric monitoring of young stellar clusters and identical outburst candidate targets for follow up study.

As is customary, after the speaker and notices, there will be festival nibbles, thanks Andy for organising.

Tonight, Tuesday 5th November 2019, we’re looking forward to welcoming Andrew Lound to our November monthly meeting.

Andrew will be looking at Uranus and the history of William Herschel’s discovery of that fabulous planet. Andrew’s full bio is in this month’s newsletter.

Andy Burns has put together a bumper newsletter, with lots of contributions from members, thanks Andy!

Tonight, Tuesday 1st October 2019, we’re excited to welcome Dr Chris Pearson from RAL Space in Harwell, Oxfordshire to our October monthly meeting.

Chris will present the state of the art on what is surely one of the most exciting topics in all of science today, Exoplanets. Chris will also cover his involvement in Esa’s ARIEL mission that is currently in development.

Tonight, Tuesday 3rd September, we kick off our new season with a thanks to Andy Burns for his dedication to the society over 25 years and continuing to publish our PDF newsletter. Here’s to another 25 years!

For our meeting tonight, we will be in the capable hands of Steve Tonkin who will talk about Time and Calendars and the relevance to astronomy. To see more from Steve, check out his website https://astunit.com. Steve’s talk will be followed by our (short) AGM. Thank you to all the committee volunteers and those that help the society.

Note on this month’s featured image. We had a couple of members travel out to Argentina and Chile for the total solar eclipse in the crisp skies of the Andes. Here is an image from Peter Chappell. Image detail: 3rd Contact: f6.3, ISO 3200, shutter speed (S/S) 1/160 of a second at 400 mm.