[Chaos-l] Venus Transit at Morehead Planetarium

[Tony Rice]

Thanks for sharing that Robert.  Please, everyone else who had the
chance to view the transit, especially if you shared it with others,
whether at Morehead or not, take a moment to share your experiences
here.  With individuals permission of course, I'd like to put them
together and share them on the club website.

I'll elaborate on mine when I get a few minutes later but it involves
a crying child that was disappointed because she had to choose between
"going potty" and standing in one of the very long lines for a
telescope.  I was busy in the science stage most of the evening but
ran out to my car, got my sunspotter and showed this little girl (and
another 100 people) the transit for about 15 minutes before losing it
behind the trees.  The mother and the little girl couldn't have been
more excited or appreciative.

-Tony

On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 8:03 AM, Robert Nielsen <robertnielsen at nc.rr.com> wrote:
> Well, while Allen was sneaking views over at Medoc, and some of my other friends were in their yards with binoculars and scopes, almost a dozen of us CHAOS members setup at the Morehead Planetarium for what was going to be a crazy event!
>
> The skies were clear as we setup.   5-6 of us (Jayme, Phil, Mark, Walter, and some others) setup their scopes on the 4th floor balcony of the planetarium, which seemed to be a really good spot!   Thanks for Mickey and Amy and other folks from the planetarium for figuring that out.   And a few of us (including Jack and myself) setup down on the lawn near the building.   I setup down there thinking that having scopes in two completely separate areas would help the flow of people ... and I think it did.   Speaking of people, quite a few showed up ... like over 3000!    There were people *everywhere* in the front parking lot of the planetarium, as well as inside (seeing shows).
>
> From the minute I had the scope on the mount, people wanted to look through it (even though the transit wouldn't start for another hour or so).   I would talk to people and explain about the Ha scope and how it showed only one wavelength of light, how the pressure tuner adjusted for doppler shift of the Ha frequency), and people seemed to be generally interested!  In fact, I talked to one of the gentlemen who was most interested and eventually found out that he knew some people that I had worked with in Zurich!   All through the night it was a very friendly crowd!
>
> Then, right before the transit started, a big ominous cloud appeared.   It just sat there and didn't move, like most of the others had previously.  When a break would seem to almost appear, another cloud would combine with it and block the view.   I looked at the Doppler radar on my smartphone, and saw rain heading south from Roxboro.   At that point I was planning what I would do if the rain appeared and was telling people it didn't look good.
>
> But then around 6:15, the clouds started to break.   I quickly mounted my camera to the scope and took a few pictures (nothing spectacular ... but I do have pictures of the transit!) and then after a couple of minutes I finally let people see the transit, starting with the man who had stood at the front of the line for the full half hour that it was cloudy.
>
> The actual transit in the Lunt scope looked great!   Many times, people would step up to the scope and go "wow!"   They had only seen the transit through the cardboard "eclipse glasses" that had been handed out, and in those the planet was only a pinprick.  In the scope ... it was a completely obvious large dot.  No problem seeing it at all.    After the initial viewing of Venus on the Sun, I would tell people to look at the edge of the Sun for "flames" (prominences) and when they saw them, people literally freaked out.  One young lady got back in line three times, with three different sets of friends, to show them the view of the sun "with flames".
>
> After the initial "big cloud" at the start, we essentially had no clouds until right about the time the Sun went behind trees and the horizon from ground level.   So the people kept coming, and coming, and coming.   Like I said, the estimates were that there were between 3000 and 4000 people there, and 8-9 scopes, so you do the math.   I easily had 300 people look through my scope - including one very young girl (I urged the dad to put her up to the eyepiece to say she had seen the transit) all the way to elderly grandmothers who had a little trouble finding the image in the eyepiece ... but did eventually.
>
> The worst part of the evening was when the Sun set behind trees ... and the event was over, with people still left in line.   Nothing much I could do!   Some of the views through the trees were very nice ... at one point I saw (yes, I inserted myself in line around 50 times to "check the focus" and view the transit myself) the Sun behind tree branches, with a solar prominence clearly visible at the top, and Venus clearly visible at the bottom.
>
> When the Sun dropped below the trees from ground level, a cloud bank appeared far off in the west and stopped the viewing from up on the balcony, I believe (someone from up there should correct me if I'm wrong).   So I started packing up, although I was still talking to people (including some cute girls ... don't always get that at observing sessions) for a half hour after it was over.  I also talked to Amy and Mickey from the planetarium and heard some of the stories they had trying to manage the throng of people.  And I also helped some folks bring the equipment down from the roof.  I'm glad I did, because Jayme caught what we think was a weather balloon in his refractor!  Very cool ... you could clearly see the balloon itself, with a payload swinging in the wind below it.  I wonder if they were trying to get pictures of the transit from up there!   Before we left, we think it popped ... since it disappeared from view.
>
> All in all, it was one of the most exciting public outreach events I've ever been to.   One can only think that we touched many, many lives last night helping them see this rare event ... and I know I was thanked over and over by visitors for being a part of it.  Kudos to the planetarium for putting it together, and kudos to CHAOS for helping out.   Perhaps we ignited a spark in a few people last night!
>
> Robert
>
> Sent from my iPad
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