Comet Lovejoy C/2014 Q2

With some luck the sky will be open and you can observe Comet C/2014 Q2 with the naked eye.

Solstitium Astronomical Winter

Today at 0:03 local time (23h03 UT 21/12 ) the astronomical winter started for Belgium.

Astronomical highlights 2014

The 2014 was a year with quit some interesting astronomical highlights.
The most impressive was seeing live the Space Shuttle "Enterprise" in New York. It was also my first time observing noctilucent clouds and my first article in the astronomical magazine "Heelal".

Startrail with in the background the Abbey of Averbode.

Since March I'm owning my personal weather station Oregon Scientific WMR200

My first time photographing Jupiter.

A lucky shot when photographing sunspots, a plane crossed in front of the sun.

More then 500 pictures taken to have 1 picture with lightning

Beautiful collored rainbow taken early in the morning.

My second solargraph from december till june.

This is a real wow moment, observing noctilucent clouds...

Standing in front of the Space Shuttle "Enterprise". What a spacecraft!

Double rainbow picture which was also published in the Magazine "Heelal"

Phantom sun or sun dog picture.

Time for Solargraphs

How to make your own Solargraph?

Tomorrow December 21, time to install your Solargraph. I'm ready as I prepared three solargraphs this afternoon. Location will be visited tomorrow and then waiting for 6 months on the results.
Have fun ... or better have patience!

Periodic Table of elements

When entering the lobby of the Campus Library Arenberg in Leuven, a life-size display of the periodic table of elements took my attention. This table of Mendeleev is presented in a way that each element has it's own box. And each box is representing the element in its's pure form, the way it's found in nature like minerals and some practical applications.

My Article published in Heelal

In the latest magazine of "Heelal" (vol 59, nr 12, december 2014, p 416) my article on double rainbow and the picture is published. This is my first article and of course is a nice recognition :)

Phantom Sun or Sun Dog

This afternoon @ Averbode, I could observe a beautiful sun dog or phantom sun. A Sun dog or phantom sub is a member of the family of halos. These are created by light interacting with ice crystals in the upper regions of the atmosphere. Sun dogs appear mostly as two subtly-colored patches of light (with red nearest the sun) to the left and right of the sun, approximately 22° distant and at the same elevation above the horizon as the sun. Best observarion time is when the sun is low above the horizon.
Both pictures are taken with Nikon D60 using a AF-S Nikkor DX 18-200.

Astronomical news

More astronomical information or links to websites you can find on my page Usefull Links.
An interesting website with the most recent and latest astronomical news is Astronieuws.nl.
The information shared is in the Dutch language, but they reference the original sources.

Double rainbow explained and Alexander's dark band.

A rain droplet functions both as a mirror and prism.

As the first, primary, rainbow is caused by refraction and reflection of sunlight within rain drops, the secundary rainbow will show up when sunlight is reflected twice within the droplet. This also explains the reason why we see the reversed order of the colors. Because of the extra reflection and thus light gets lost, we see the secundary rainbow less bright than the primary rainbow.

Another phenomenon is the area between the primary and secundary rainbow. This area is typical darker and called Alexander's band or Alexander's dark band. This optical phenomenon was the first time described by Alexander of Aphrodisias, 200AD.

Double Rainbow in Averbode

Startrail Summer triangle

Startrail of the summer triangle. This triangle is made by the brightest stars Vega, Altair and Deneb of the constellations Lyra, Aquila and Cygnus. Picture taken using by Nikon D60 and pictures stacked using Startrail.de and final modified using CS4.

Usefull Links

More astronomical links available. See my "Usefull Links Page" 

Record High Temperature

Today, October 18 2014, a record high outside temperature was registrated in Belgium. The previous record was recorded 100 years ago. In Averbode a temperature of 25,5°C was measured around 17h08.

Eclipse August 21, 2017

The eclipse of 21 august 2017 in the US will be a unique opportunity to experience a total solar eclipse combined with a visit to the US.

Interesting websites : see usefull links on this blog 

Visiting the Royal Observatory

Yesterday we made a trip to Ukkel near Brussels for visiting the Royal Observartory and the KMI Royal Weather Instute. Workshops for children and well explained experiments made this Open door day a real learning event.

Beside astronomy also information about seismology, spectroscopy, diffusion, aurora's, Gaia, interferometry, absorption, emission, meteo radars, solar-terrestrial centre of excellence and many more...

Launching of a Weather balloon. The balloon is filled with Hydrogen and will explode on a height of about 30km.

One of the many telescopes which are not in use or even not functioning any more. The use of observatory in Chili are taken over the current instrumentarium.

Royal Observatory Open doors

The fiftieth anniversary of the Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy (BIRA), open the IASB, the RMI and the Royal Observatory their doors on Saturday 11th and Sunday 12th October.

See also this website.

Astronomy Picture

Check out this awesome image from Astronomy Picture of the Day!

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap140930.html

Active Sun with sunspots

This sunny afternoon the sun could be seen with sunspots 2172, 2173 and 2175.

Primary Mirror

Time to clean the primary mirror of my 12" Telescoop. This is always a difficult and sensitive activity but necessary. After re-installing the mirror the telescoop is collimated and ready for use.

Moon and Saturn

Both pictures from the Moon and Saturn are taken couple of hours before Saturn will disapear behind the Moon near Hawaii.

The Moon is only 12% illuminated and is as low as 5 degrees above the horizon (18h16 UT)

Picture of Saturn, east from the Moon and as close as 1 degree. Later this night Saurn will be disapearing behind the Moon. This will be seen near Hawii.

Astronomical Autumn

Today at 4h29 the astronomical autumn starts. September Equinox happens when the plane of Earth's Equator passes through the center of our Sun. For Belgium this happens at 2h29UT, september 23. It rarely happens on september 21, which is the common accepted date for the start of the autumn.  

Helios Meeting 21 September

After two months of summer holliday, Helios came together for their monthly meeting.
An overview was given of Project Alma (Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array).

Other topics the team discussed :

- Open Door Day Royal Meteoroligical Institute of Belgium 11&12 October 2015

- Partial Sun Eclips in Belgium March 20, 2015 : Faroe Islands or local event :)
- Visit of Averbode Abbey in view of 45th Anniverary of Helios (date TBD)
- Workshop Water Rocket Launching (date TBD)
- Solar Activity observed via Radio Astronomy (date TBD)

Noctilucent clouds July 4th

On July 4th, noctilucent clouds could be observed in Belgium. This month the VVS discussed this event in their monthly journal "Heelal".

Making your own Solargraph

Do you want to start making your own Solargraph.
See my Webtag "Solargraph" with all information needed. Have fun!

Cassiopeia with deep sky M31& Double Cluster

Iridium Flare

Photographing satellites needs always some preparation. Looking up the right time and location at the sky and adjusting the setting of the DSLR. The above picture is taken with settings ISO100 and 83s exposure time and afterwards modified using CS4.

Startrail Cygnus constellation

Milkyway in Cygnus constellation taken with Nikon D60 body using celestron d70/f400mm telescoop. Picture modified using CS4.

Waning Gibbous Moon

Picture taken with Nikon D60 body and Celestron d70/f400 telescoop. Picture modified using CS4.

Lunar Diffraction Ring

Sun eclips march 20, 2015

Still 6 months to go to plan for the sun eclips. The eclips will be seen in Europe on march 20, 2015.
It is the last total eclips in europe untill 2026. Totallity occurs in a vary wide path of more than 400km but north of europe as in the Faroe Islands and Spitsbergen.  In Belgium we will be seeing a partial eclips with 80% of suns surface covered by the moon. The entire eclips can be seen in the morning of march 20, when of course the sky is without any clouds!

Meteorites at the American Museum of Natural History in New York

Beside animals, Dino's, culture, ... the American Museum of Natural History in New York has a also a big collection of meteorites. The classification is well explained and some really big meorites are presented.

I like also the new Hayden Big Bang Theater.

Together with the theater it shows a cosmic Pathway laying out the 13 billion year history of our universe and scales of the universe illustrating the size of the universe till the size of sub atomic particles.