Tuesday 28 May 2013

What Amateur Astronomers do in Daylight



Sunspot 1754 imaged from my backyard in white light using my thirteen year old ETX 90Ra
Credit: White light whole Solar disc image NASA SOHO

The 28th May 2013 was a nice sunny day in Oulton Broad.  So whilst Toot sat in the garden with her crochet hook and wool, I dusted off my old ETX 90Ra catadioptric scope and set about imaging a big sunspot that was moving slowly across the photosphere of the solar disc.

Sunspot 1754 is so big it could more or less swallow the Earth!  Good job its 93 million miles away.

As the Sun is at solar maximum, it is quite surprising that there are so few spots to be seen.  Last night, I was reading an old astronomy book and came across some plates showing the Sun's disc in 1957.  Back then, when I was a boy, it was covered in spots.  So what's up with our Sun now?

No need to panic, the end of the world is not nigh, but clearly something different is going on deep within the Sun.

The Solar Photosphere on the 21st December 1957
approaching solar maximum



Please remember not to stare at the Sun or look at it through binoculars or a telescope as such acts will at best damage your eyesight and at worst cause blindness.  I used specialist filters and equipment to create the above images.

My ETX 90Ra in my Backyard
just after I took the Sunspot images

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