An Asteroid For Amateur Viewers

whovian writes: "Caught this at CNN. This weekend there will be a asteroid traveling close enough to Earth to be seen by small telescope and perhaps binoculars. CNN's article is here while the venerable Sky and Telescope's is here. Time to try the ol' binocular plus digital camera trick!"

Ah yes, the ol' binocular plus digital camera

[canthusus]

You might find an SLR camera lense plus digital camera might do the trick - see my own bodge [grayfamily.org.uk]

Frustration

[nygeek]

Unfortunately, everything I've found on the web is written for people who have better knowledge of astronomy than I do.

• My clock shows New York time but all of the charts on the web sites show Universal Time (UT) ... how do I convert UT to New York time? I know that UT is approximatly the same as London time, so it should correspond to five hours earlier than local time in NY. BUT I also know that one distinction between UT and London time is that UT doesn't do the summer time/winter time (daylight saving time, standard time) tango.
• I don't know the constellations (sigh). I do have a powerful pair of binoculars, but I don't know where to point them. Any clues?

Re:Frustration

[Ark42]

.. I second that ..

You think at least the CNN article would tell me when the hell the UT time is for me and which of the 4 basic directions I should be looking? Are those constilations in the north, south, west or east sky for me? WTF?

Re:Frustration

[Yunzil]

I realize all this is moot now, but for future reference....

how do I convert UT to New York time?

EDT is UT - 4
EST is UT - 5

I don't know the constellations (sigh). I do have a powerful pair of binoculars, but I don't know where to point them. Any clues?

You can find north by imagining a line running through the two stars at the end of the bowl of the Big Dipper. Extend the line, and the first fairly bright start you hit is Polaris (the North Star).

In the summer, in the N. hemisphere, three bright stars are prominent much of the night: Deneb, Vega, and Altair. They are called the "Summer Triangle". Altair is the one at the sharpest angle in the triangle. Deneb is the one in the constellation that looks like a cross (really Cygnus the swan). Vega is the other one. :)

Use these charts, but no binoculars!

[Caractacus Potts]

If you go to the Sky and Telescope site, you can get awesome charts for locating this asteroid. These charts show all stars at least 9th magnitude in brightness. Using brand new 10x50 binoculars, I can see all 9th magnitude stars, but just barely. The asteroid is predicted to be between 9th and 10th magnitude, so it looks like I'm out of luck. BTW, I'm out in the country with very clear skies. Anyway, go to the Sky and Telescope site [skyandtelescope.com] (cookies req), download the charts and give it a shot. OK, back to my regular programming...