Logan Valley Star Party 2019 Summary

Weather and sky conditions:

• • Thursday, May 30, 2019: clear, but dewy after a series of thunderstorms

  • Friday, May 31, 2019: clear, also dewy but perfect transparency

  • Saturday, June 1, 2019: clear, perfect transparency

  • Sunday, June 2, 2019: cloudy until 10:15; clear; cloudy from midnight to 1 AM then clear rest of night with perfect transparency

  • Monday, June 3, 2019: clear, perfect transparency, some wind

  • Tuesday, June 4, 2019: clear, perfect transparency

  • No sky glow anywhere; could start serious viewing to the south and southeast around 9:30 PM; Polaris visible with finder scope around 8:30 PM for polar alignment.

  • Magnitude 15 easily seen with my Meade 14" SCT; getting look-back times to over 600 million light-years.

  • Personal comments: John shares: "This year I concentrated on distant and dim galaxies. One night I observed and logged in over 100! Also I felt privileged to be among the most gifted Astro-imagers in our region." Robert shares: "Burton and I stayed two more nights and Sean 1 extra night but got clouded out the last night and drove home in the rain so we did actually experience the best of the weather while there. I would have loved to do a few more targets!  Maybe next year!  That place spoiled me! LOL in that I now have no desire to take pictures from my bortel 7 zone in the city!  What a difference dark sky will make!"

  • Seven serious Astro-imagers setup their extreme high-tech instruments. Will share and post some of their images as soon as I receive them.

Dan (with Nancy), Olympia, WA, Astro-imager; Chuck, West Seattle, WA, Astro-imager; Robert (with Karen), Meridian, ID, Astro-imager

Ed, Bozeman, MT, serious observer with "Elvira"; Burton (with Carol), Emmett, ID, Astro-imager

Wade, Snohomish, WA, Astro-imager; Roger, Astroia, OR, Astro-imager; Sean, Issaquah, WA, Astro-imager

Robert put together an exceptional YouTube composite with all of the astro-images he took at Logan Valley (except the Moon).

Here's the hyperlink:  https://youtu.be/AdZlKPrp2Hc

Astro-images below - 6 images from 5 targets taken by Robert:

Sean's astro-image: Sagittarius Region - digital SLR, 85 mm lens , f 1.4 for 5-minutes:

Sean's astro-image: M51 (NGC 5194 NGC 5195) at 23 mly - 3-hour exposure; notice the small edge-on galaxy IC 4277 Mv=15.7 (distance unknown) off to the lower left; cutoff bottom left center is IC 4278 at Mv=15.7 230 mly:

Nancy's bird photo - Kestrel; and capturing serious discussion concerning-astro images:

Additional images of Logan Valley Star Party by Robert: