AP 17

The Mighty Hunter Orion

With ~mag 7 satellite trail. Jan 14 2016, 2157 UT. 

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Mysterious KIC 8462852

>20 second exposure with an 8″ SCT; the enigmatic dimming star (mag 12, arrowed) and its apparent stellar neighbourhood. Field of view is 28 x 20 arcminutes, centred at RA/DE 20h06m/+44°24′ in Cygnus. Jan 27 2016, 1927 UT.

1 – TYC 3162-677-1 (KIC 8462934), mag 11.5; 2 – TYC 3162-977-1, mag 11.9; 3 – TYC 3162-879-1, mag 11.4; 4 – TYC 3162-625-1 (KIC 8463380), mag 10.7; 5 – TYC 3162-945-1, mag 10.4; 6 – TYC 3162-1001-1, mag 11.6; 7 – TYC 3162-742-1 (KIC 8398626), mag 11.2; 8 – TYC 3162-1320-1 (KIC 8398535), mag 11.6; 9 – TYC 3162-1037-1, mag 11; 10 – HD 191081, mag 9.9

11 – TYC 3162-808-1, mag 12; 12 – TYC 3162-324-1, mag 10.8; 13 – HD 191137, mag 10.6; 14 – BD+43 3483 (KIC 8397812), mag 9.9; 15 – HD 190966 (KIC 8397460), mag 10.1; 16 – TYC 3162-1155-1 (KIC 8397426), mag 10.9; 17 – TYC 3162-300-1, mag 10.9; 18 – TYC 3162-1033-1, mag 10.9; 19 – TYC 3162-815-1 (KIC 8526108), mag 11.6; 20 – TYC 3162-905-1, mag 10.8.

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Solar Disc, February 2016

Left, Feb 1st; sunspot in 2 o’c sector; right, Feb 10th; sunspot(s) in 12 o’c sector.

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Lunar Terminator, 9 Days 11hrs 23 mins

Feb 18 2016, 0201 UT. Numbers denote miles in diameter. 8″ SCT with DSLR, 1/200 sec exposure.

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252P/ Comet LINEAR

The sixth closest approach of any comet in recorded history, 252P/LINEAR passed 3.5 million miles from the Earth on March 21 2016, in southern skies. Seen here as a nebulous mass of ~15′ diameter at 0334 UT March 31 from a distance of 6.3 million miles; est mag 6.5. With (a) xi Serpentis. [Fourteenth observed comet].

Closest cometary approaches: 1) Lexell – 1770, 1.4 million miles; 2) Tempel-Tuttle – 1366, 2.12; 3) BA14 (Pan-STARRS) – 2016, 2.14; 4) IRAS-Araki-Alcock – 1983, 2.9; 5) Halley – 837, 3.1; 6) 252P/LINEAR – 2016, 3.3.

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Active Region 2529, April 2016

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Asteroid (7) Iris

Discovered by Hind in 1847; mag 9.6 (circled), in Ophiuchus; diameter 124 ml, Earth distance 175m miles. With (M) Mars, 6 days before opposition at mag -1.9; (ST) Saturn, mag 0.2, with Titan, mag 9, immediately adjacent; and (A) Antares, mag 1. May 16 2016, 0156 IST.

CHAPTER XVIII