Partly cloudy skies greeted 32 visitors (19 children and 13 adults) from the University Heights Public School Grade-5 / 6 class to the Cronyn Observatory for an evening of Exploring the Stars, Tuesday, October 22nd, 2013, 7:00 p.m. Graduate student Dilini Subasinghe made the digital slide presentation, “The Big Bang,” and this was followed by questions from the students.
RASC London Centre members Everett Clark and Bob Duff made ready the telescopes. Everett directed the big 25.4cm refractor and Bob suggested the Double-Double star system Epsilon Lyrae, which was nicely resolved in the 17mm Nagler eyepiece (258X). Clouds later obscured the sky and Everett directed the big refractor towards the communications tower in south London, using the 32mm Erfle eyepiece (137X). A few visitors viewed Vega through the 25.4cm refractor towards the end of the evening. An International Space Station (ISS) pass (8:36—8:38 p.m.) was not observed because of clouds.
Bob set up the RASC London Centre’s 25.4cm Dobsonian with the 18mm Tele Vue Radian eyepiece (62X) on the Observatory’s roof patio and showed visitors the yellow and blue double star Albireo. He later showed them Vega and then the weathervane on the Engineering building. Everybody was gone by 9:00 p.m. after a very informative and enjoyable evening of astronomy.