70.000 Visitors

Cool! ..... reaching 70.000 visitors for my astroblog. Thank you all!

Sun in OIII and Ca-K

In the late afternoon I took some pictures of the Sun with Sunspots AR2859 and AR2860.

Setting : Nikon D7500 and TAL200K with Solarfilm ND3.8 and ND3.8 with OIII filter and ND3.8 with Ca-K filter

Green Flash

I was looking at my pictures taken taken during my vacation at the Belgian Coast @De Panne. On July 18th I was able to take a picture of Green Flash - see my blog  but  also on July 17th. When looking at the details of the those pictures I saw aswell a Green Flash. This time the flash was observed a little above the horizon. The Green Flash on July 18th was a little higher above the horizon. 

To conclude: I was able to photograph twice a Green Flash during my holliday. Really Cool!

Editing Sun H-Alpha

I reworked my picture of the Sun which I made yesterday - see this link
The bright and enormous prominence has now more contrast. 

Sun in H-Alpha

This afternoon I observed the Sun in H-alpha using my SolarMax III d70/400 f/5.3 DS BF15. The spotless sundisk showed a couple of big filaments and one huge prominence. 

The picture was taken with Nikon D7500, ISO400 and 1/320s. Editing using CS4.

NOSS Double in Milky Way

Only one bright perseid meteor and a couple of faint ones during an hour observation from UT20h15-21h30 on August 13th. As the sky was very clear I decided to take some pictures of the milky way using my wide field lens 10-24mm. It's clear that the sky is overloaded with satellites and satellite debris as all of my pictures have at least one satellite trace. The picture shows a double trace of the Naval Ocean Surveillance System. This "NOSS Double" is formed by NOSS 3-7(A) and NOSS 3-7(R).

Awards MAI75 SSTV Exp 65 6&7 august

During the MAI75 SSTV event on August 6&7, 2021 I was able to download some pictures from the ISS. The results were submitted and finally awarded. 

Links can be found on this blog for future submittals : Usefull Links

My picture on National TV

My picture, which I took this morning, of a double rainbow at the Demer river in Langdorp (Aarschot) was broadcasted on the National TV. During "Het Weer", the daily weather forecast from channel 1, my picture was presented by Bram Verbruggen.

MAI-75 SSTV Expedition 65 August 6&7

The Moscow Aviation Institute (MAI) did a couple of quick experiment sessions of SSTV during parts of August 6 and 7. The setup started at 10:50 UTC on August 6 and transmissions stopped around 19:10 UTC. The activation on August 7 started this morning about 09:50 UTC and ended 17:30 UTC. ISS setting : the usual PD120 format on the standard downlink frequency of 145.800 MHz.

I used the 70m high antenne with webSDR "Nürnberg skyscraper" and MMSSTV software.

I could download 7 pictures of which one was very poor quality. The quality of the others are good but none of the pictures are perfectly alligned. 

Lecture When Black Holes are Massive - Studium Generale

Professor Marta Volonteri, Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris, and Professor by special appointment in Black Hole Formation and Growth, University of Amsterdam will give a lecture on september 27. The title of the lecture, organized by Studium Generale Maastricht,  "When Black Holes are Massive".

Solar Astronomy Book

This week I received the new english book "Solar Astronomy" which is a translation of the popular "Astronomie Solaire". I was able to get a signed version of the book.

The webpage tells the following :

Solar Astronomy is a wonderful introduction and reference for anyone interested in our star the Sun and particularly anyone interested in participating in the adventure of understanding the Sun by observing it themselves.

We live at a particularly exciting time in the study of the Sun with major, new space-based and ground-based, long-term full-Sun and high-resolution observations returning spectacular images and measurements, advancing our knowledge of existing challenges and revealing new phenomena of this fascinating dynamic physical laboratory, exemplar of all of the stars in the universe, and source of essentially all of the energy that makes life possible, ever changing on timescales from seconds to decades.

This all-encompassing, modern, and authoritative collection addresses the latest developments in optical, radio, and eclipse observations of the Sun and should be of broad appeal to the solar physics pro–am community, and beyond, providing the reader with the understanding and tools to be an active participant in the fantastic progress being made in our enjoyment and exploration of our neighborhood star.

In presenting the background and the tools for moving forward in our understanding and appreciation of the Sun, this book also makes available to the world the accomplishments of modern “amateur” solar physicists.

My congratulations to Christian Viladrich and colleagues for this beautiful work sharing their passion for observing the Sun, up close and personal, and paving the way for others to join in the adventure.

See also this website.