NOAA18 Weather image 28122020 UT09h50

Today's Weather image from NOAA18 UT09h50

My Astronomical Highlights 2020

A rather stange year due to the Covid-19 pandemic but still, I was able to got out and watched the sky. Some of my astronomical hightlights in 2020 and astronomical "wow" moments are listed below :

#1 Attending live the launch of Space-X Falcon 9 (CRS-20) from Cape Canaveral SLC40
#2 Comet Neowise C/2020 F3 visible with the naked eye and I could capture both dust as plasma tails
#3 Planet Saturn was observed a couple of days after opposition in almost perfect conditions. Also Mars and Jupiter were observed.
#4 In the evening of July 5th, an impressive sky with NLC covering the sky up to 40°
#5 Making progress in Deepsky photography with M31, M51 and Horsehead nebula in H-alpha


Worth mentioning :

#6 Supernova SN2020jfo in M61. My first supernova which I could track (100days) and making detailed pictures.
#7 My fartest Deepsky objects so far: 3 quasars of which HS 0624+6907 is located at distance of 4.56 billion ly away from Earth.
#8 Communication with NOAA weather satellites and ISS station (ARISS SSTV)
#9 The Sun is awakening with some big sunspots at the end of the year. I was able to see the sunspots with the naked eye... first time ever and remember: don't do this at home
#10 Finishing my Moon sequence from full moon till new moon

Storm Bella over Belgium

Retrieving weather image from satellite NOAA 18 UT10h01 with storm Bella over Belgium and other parts of Europe.

Setting : WebSDR ESA Noordwijk, Software WXToIMG, Decoding with NOAA-ATP and editing using CS4 and DeNoise AI

ARISS SSTV Award - Contact with ISS 20years ARISS

ARISS (Amateur Radio on the ISS (International Space Station)) is celebrating 20years of service. To celebrate this, the Russian radio on board of the ISS is transmitting between X-mas and New year. In total 12 pictures can be downloaded each 1minute transmitting time. I'm using webSDR located in Nürnberg (Germany) each time the ISS is flying over. As I completed one image, I was rewarded with my first ever ARISS SSTV Award. Cool!

In the mean time I downloaded a couple of images. Below the one with the best quality.

Jupiter-Saturn X-mas

Jupiter and Saturn at X-mas evening.

Mercury Transit of May 9th 2016 - pictures reworked

Cleaning up my disk with astropictures I found avi movies of my observation of the Mercury transit of May 9th, 2016. I was at that time not able to proces the files. So I reworked the files using AutoStakkert! using image stabilization anchor and planet selection. Final editing done using CS4.
Setting : Dobson 12" and ZWOASI224MC camera.

X-Mas Contact with ISS

This morning I was able to download images from the ISS while visual seeing the ISS from my backgarden. Really cool!
I'm using websdr located in Nurnberg (Germany) to connect with the ISS. The picture of the ISS (and Envisat) is taken above my location.



Background :
An ARISS Slow Scan TV (SSTV) event is scheduled from the International Space Station (ISS) for late December. This will be a special SSTV event to celebrate the 20th anniversary of ARISS operations on the ISS. The event is scheduled to begin on December 24 and continue through December 31. Details to follow later. Dates are subject to change due to ISS operational adjustments.
Times for the event appear to have the activity being setup and starting after 16:40 UTC on December 24 and running continuously until 18:15 UTC on December 31.