Star Party Tonight

I am pleased to present this paper that I co-authored with two teachers and submitted to JDSO this year as part of the Boyce Astro program. Hilde van den Bergh1, Chris Olivas2, Jerry Hilburn3 Mentor, BEWiSE, Fleet Science Center, San Diego, California, USA. Chris Olivas, High Tech Middle School, San Marcos, California, USA. Epsilon Orion […]

I shot this on July 4th 2016 with a Canon 6D and a 135mm EF Redline piggy backed to a AVX mount. 3 shots stacked, each 2 minutes long at 800 ISD. First pretty picture I have taken with the new camera. Click Link for Full Size

Friday night I started calibration and testing of the imaging system at 8PM. By 10pm I was ready to start taking data on the Halloween Asteroid. When I first moved the scope into position and started shooting I tried a series of 60 second shots, then 30 second, then 10 second shots. The challenge was […]

The summer sky never disappoints us, especially the jeweled region of the southern Milky Way. Rising up out of steam from the pot of Sagittarius we find one sparkly pretty after another. Here I present to you a nebula known as The Trifid. I shot this using a 8″ f/4 TPO Newtonian with a Canon […]

Speeding toward a historic flyby on July 14 – just over 98 days from now – NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft has moved into the second phase of its approach to Pluto and its moons, beginning a series of observations and activities that will bring these distant, icy worlds into sharper focus than humankind has ever […]

By:  Taylor Menconi, Copy Editor The sky is no longer the limit for Mr. Prodan’s AP European History classes. On Monday, Feb. 9, the AP Euro students and their families visited Charter after school hours from 7 to 8:30 p.m. to star-gaze with NASA Ambassador Jerry Hilburn, who was invited by Mr. Prodan. “Since we’ve […]

Neil DeGrasse Tyson born October 5, 1958) is an American astrophysicist, cosmologist, author, and science communicator. Since 1996, he has been the Frederick P. Rose Director of the Hayden Planetarium at the Rose Center for Earth and Space. Best viewed Full Screen “To Build A Home” Cinematic Orchestra There is a house built out of […]

Down the road a bit, we Earthlings will become Marslings. Before the first colony is  established on Mars quite a bit of work will be done to prepare the way for the first settlers . Currently there are thousands of really bright people working on the challenges of reaching Mars. A recent article on ArXiv (at the Cornell […]

It’s the most wonderful time of the year — for spotting a Geminid meteor! The 2014 Geminid meteor shower is forecast to be a lively meteor shower with great views in the skies over Earth. The week of Dec. 8 is a good window for Geminid-watching, but the night of Dec. 13-14 is the anticipated […]

The Kuiper Belt object, Pluto since its discovery in 1930 has revealed little about its characteristics. The NASA/JPL probe New Horizons is now one month away from the start of mission observations of the dwarf planet. New Horizons has been travelling to Pluto for nearly 9 years. After  a journey of more than 8 years the spacecraft […]

Asteroids; traditionally, most have been bodies in the inner Solar System.[6] Main-belt asteroids, those following roughly circular orbits between Mars and Jupiter. These are the original and best-known group of asteroids or minor planets. Near-Earth asteroids, those whose orbits take them inside the orbit of Mars. Further subclassification of these, based on orbital distance, is […]