Cloudy skies greeted 39 visitors (24 children and 15 adults) from the 66th London Scouts to the Cronyn Observatory for Exploring the Stars on Wednesday, March 6th, 2013, 6:30 p.m. The group actually consisted mostly of Beavers and Cubs, with 2 Scouts. Graduate student Allison Hill began the evening with a solar system drawing activity and followed this with the slide presentation, “The Scout / Guide Astronomy Badge,” and answered questions.
Everett Clark and Bob Duff represented RASC London Centre. Everett arrived early, making ready the 25.4cm refractor in the dome and also setting up the London Centre’s 25.4cm Dobsonian on the roof patio, installing the 8X50mm right-angle finderscope and 17mm Nagler eyepiece (66X), and directing it towards the weathervane on the Engineering building.
Bringing the group upstairs into the dome Allison directed the 25.4cm refractor towards the communications tower in south London and showed everybody views of the tower through the telescope, using the 32mm Erfle eyepiece (137X). Allison inquired concerning the distance to the communications tower and Everett determined it to be 7.4 km, after accessing an on-line interactive map on the computer in the dome. Bob showed the visitors the weathervane on the Engineering building through the 25.4cm Dobsonian, through both the 17mm Nagler eyepiece (66X) and the 8X50 mm finderscope. They were also intrigued by the red bulls-eye projected on the Telrad finder.
Towards the end of the evening Allison handed out 17 “Secrets of the Night Sky” (Canadian Space Agency) sky charts. The visitors were gone by around 8:20 p.m., after giving an enthusiastic thank you for a very enjoyable evening of astronomy, despite the cloudy weather.
Bob Duff
Higher Education Liaison
RASC London Centre