April 26, 2013 – RAC General Meeting – Officer for the Meeting:  Ian Hewitt

RAC was privileged to bring in Rod Mollise from Alabama for tonight’s meeting.  Rod is now a contributing editor for Sky & Telescope Magazine.  He has recently completed a big project:  observing 2500 deep-sky objects cataloged by William and Carolina Herschel.  Rod began his discussion by giving the group a history lesson on the Herschel’s.  Wilhelm and Lina (William and Caroline) were born in Hannover Germany in the early1700s.  They emigrated to England.  William was initially a musician then later an astronomer.  William is most famous for discovering Uranus with a six inch telescope on March 13, 1781.  Both William and Caroline worked on an extensive sky survey from England.  William was the observer and Caroline cataloged the objects found.  With her own telescope Caroline discovered eight comets.  William constructed many telescopes including his famous 40 foot telescope.  During their sweeps, the Herschels cataloged 2377 objects.  Some of the original 2500 were duplicates and non-existent objects.

A small group of diehards observers, some new members and guests made it out to Big Woods on Friday, April 12. Despite the pollen, which is a problem when observing in April, everyone had a pretty good time. It was pretty clear for the most part, but some small clouds rolled in later in the evening. Everyone stayed out until around midnight.

The 2013 NC Science Festival started on Friday, April 5th with a "Statewide Star Party," where groups all over NC held public observing on the same day. After weeks of planning, gloom, and rain (from an unusually cool Spring) we were rewarded with an awesome sky, an excellent Museum program, and enthusiastic crowds for these festive and exciting observing events. In fact, before dark we had lines at each of the telescopes at all the events.

We would like to recognize the support of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences and the City of Raleigh's Annie Wilkerson Nature Preserve in helping to make these events so successful! These events mark a significant milestone for RAC as we solely staffed two independent observing sessions and our members supported two more events. Our thanks goes out to all the RAC members who participated to share the night sky with the public

Over 10 members of the Raleigh Astronomy Club came out to Science Thursday 3/15 at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences to view comet PanSTARRS and some other objects. Over 50 members of the public came out to brave the cold and windy conditions.

A large number of RAC members took advantage of excellent weather conditions from March 7-11 to do some spring season observing. A rare string of very good transparency coincident with the new moon allowed great observing of deep sky objects. Some members attended the Staunton River Star Party in Virgina, while others attending observing sessions in the Raleigh area.

About a dozen members made the trek to Virginia to observe at the Staunton River Star Party, which ran from Thursday-Sunday. Despite very cold conditions and some wind on Thursday and Friday, there was good viewing/imaging every night.

For those that could not make the trip to Virginia, there was plenty of observing the Raleigh area. In addition to the monthly RACOBS scheduled on Friday, there were impromptu observing sessions at both Big Woods and Howell Woods on Thursday and Saturday.