Venus Phase 0.3

Venus is still very bright during sunset. Current phase is 30% and picture taken using ASI224MC and Autostakkert!.

M37-Open Cluster

M37 is an open cluster and is one of the richest star clusters in the Messier Catalog. The cluster is located at a distance of 4500-6500 ly from us.
The picture was taken with a TAL200K using my Nikon D60 on the evening of Feb 13, 2017.

Perfect morning

After many hours of observation awaiting a beautifull sunrise on Valentine's Day.

Moon 91% - Waning Gibbous

It took a while but we have a clear sky. With waning gibbous moon 91% ...

No Luck Observing 45P/Honda Comet

Very poor seeing this morning with the consequence no observation of Comet 45P/Honda. Instead a full moon.

Helios Meeting : Fantastic Workshop Investigating Planets

Helios Members attending workshop organized by Lieven

The members of the Astronomy club Helios attended the wokshop of Lieven on how to Practical Investigate Planets on a "Saterdaymorning" based on the  book "Praktisch planeetonderzoek voor de zaterdagochtend - Sevastiaan De Vet". With basic ingrediences like oil, cacao powder, water, candle wax, ... we could demonstrate the surface of pluto with Rayleigh Bénard convection cells, vulcano eruptions at Mars and shooting out of ice at Enceladus, Saturn's moon. The cooking skills of the team were tested with succes as all experiments were completed succesfully. At the end of the workshop 360° Virtual Reality movies from Youtube were shown using VR Glasses. What a experience and will this be the new future on how we will be looking at pictures? 

We had a great and fun afternoon, thanks to Lieven to organize this fantastic workshop.

Hexa shaped Rayleigh Bénard convection cells - lookalike Pluto's Surface

Vulcano Eruption at Mars using candle was, sand and water

One minute before waterrocket lift off demostrating shooting out ice at Enceladus

Saturn Fly By using VR glasses 

Weather Summary Jan 2017

The average temperature in Jan was 0.6°C and about 4°C lower than Jan 2016. On top of this Jan 2017 had 50% less rain and 10 days more air frost days then Jan 2016.