There was a major fireball in the south west today that made national news on CNN, MSNBC and the other networks. The American Meteor Society fireball application logged over 100 witness reports. I wrote a blog article today on the AMS website about the 2011/09/14 fireball. Check it out. Good chance it left meteorites, but it might also be space trash.

Here’s a photo of the Eagle Nebula I took back in July. The nebula also referred to as the pillars of creation is a about 6500 light years away from Earth and the column of star forming gas and dust in the center is approximately 60 trillion miles high. At least we know there are somethings in the universe bigger than our national debt.

Eagle Nebula - July 2011

Here’s a higher zoom picture of the center area.

Eagle Nebula - July 2011

Primarily visible during the summer months, the Eagle Nebula is one of the most majestic and awe inspiring objects in the night sky.

We were without power for 3-4 days this week due to hurricane Irene. The power outage coincided with the new moon phase leaving the skies in northern Maryland darker than I have ever seen before. I was a little bummed that I couldn’t fire up the observatory, so I made the most of it and took some tripod shots of the Milky Way Galaxy.

Here’s a lucky shot of a bright meteor, low on the horizon. Based on the elevation angle of 8º and assuming a 80km starting point for illuminated flight, this meteor would have been about 569km SE of my location or half the distance between Maryland and Bermuda.

Milky Way Galaxy and Meteor - August 28, 2011 11:28 PM EST

Here’s the meteor at full zoom resolution. At a magnitude of 2.0, the bright star directly above the meteor is Diphda.

Milky Way Galaxy and Meteor - August 28, 2011 11:28 PM EST

Here’s another shot of the Milky Way Galaxy from the backyard.

Milky Way Galaxy - August 2011

The power went out early sunday morning. I finally got a generator on Tuesday. The first thing plugged into the generator was my observatory. I was happy to learn that all equipment and PC fired up and operated perfectly on the generator power.

Milky Way Galaxy from Freeland Observatory - August 2011

We were happy to get our power turned back on Wednesday night. Many thanks to all of the utility workers from around the country who came to the east coast to fix our power lines. You guys are much appreciated! I’m hoping hurricane Katia will be a dud or misses us.

I recently attended a NASA meteor workshop at the Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute in Western North Carolina. The workshop consisted of two days of talks put on by the world’s foremost meteor scientists. The talks centered around meteors and video cameras and all sky camera networks and topics relating to the operation and analysis of meteors using different types of cameras and software. There were some VERY cool advanced technologies showcased at this event. I was invited to speak and gave two presentations. The first presentation was about the recent work my company did for the AMS website and the second was an update on the Mason Dixon Meteor hunt. Both presentations were well received and I got a lot of new pointers and ideas that will recharge the meteorite hunt. It was really great to meet the upper echelon of the meteor community and I consider it a privilege being invited to such an exclusive event.

Here is a PDF of the workshop program which contains an agenda and abstracts of each presentation.

Here are the slides from my power point presentation.

For the MDM hunt update I used The Official Page of the Mason Dixon Meteor, as I guide for my presentation.

Here are a few astro photos I took from the PARI site.

NASA Meteor Workshop, PARI NC - August 3rd 2011

Nestled inside the Shenandoah Mountains, PARI has very nice dark skies.

NASA Meteor Workshop, PARI NC - August 3rd 2011

Allowing for a prominent Milky Way.

NASA Meteor Workshop, PARI NC - August 3rd, 2011

Here’s a picasa photo gallery with a few more pics from the trip.

And a time lapse video of all photos taken over the three days.

I imaged the Perseid Meteor Shower three nights this week capturing an average of four meteors each night. Here are the best two from the peak night. Both are fairly large, bright and long.

Perseid Meteor High Res - August 12th, 2011

I think this one may be a small fireball. You can see Cassiopeia in the shot for reference.

Perseid Meteor - August 12th, 2011

Some light cloud cover rolled in but it wasn’t enough to block this Perseid .

Perseid Meteor - August 12th, 2011

Here’s the full sized picture:

Perseid Meteor - August 12th, 2011

I have compiled all information on the Mason Dixon Meteor hunt onto a specific page. For information about the PA Fireball of July 6th, 2009 please visit:

The Official Page of The Mason Dixon Meteor

I was on vacation last week at Atlantis in the Bahamas. Here are some pictures I took of a lightning storm over the Caribbean.

Lightning, Atlantis Bahamas - July 25th, 2011

The constellation in the background is the big dipper.

Lightning, Atlantis Bahamas - July 25th, 2011

Lightning, Atlantis Bahamas - July 25th, 2011

Lightning, Atlantis Bahamas - July 25th, 2011

I caught a faint meteor during the session.

Meteor - Atlantis Bahamas - July 2011

This is the third year in a row we’ve been to Atlantis Bahamas for vacation and it was the best one yet.

One of my neighbors went to Cape Canaveral for the final Space Shuttle launch. I asked her to send me some pictures. I strung them together in this quick animation of the launch. Thanks Caron! You did a great job!

Final Space Shuttle Launch Animation - Photo Credit Caron Wills - July 8th, 2011

Mind = Blown

I had a good run on globular clusters during last month’s new moon phase that culminated with this color shot of M5. Note the faint green trail of a satellite in the upper left. The only reason its green is because I was shooting through a green filter when the satellite crossed the field of view.

Messier 5 - June 7th, 2011

I have been transitioning from DSLR astrophotography to CCD photography. The CCD cameras are way better and the quality and overall ease of things is much better, but there is a bit of a learning curve. I’m still working out some issues with the optics and guiding combos. This photo guided perfectly with the MOAG, but due to the way things are connected, I can’t use the field flattener / corrector when I’m using the MOAG. As a result, there is distortion and stretching at the outer corners. I have since setup a guide-scope, so I can use the corrector and I’m getting worse guide results now. So there’s still work to be done… All this aside, M5 turned out pretty good for the first attempt at a color shot and July is starting out nicely too.

Photo Details
30x30x30 RGB
Camera SBIG ST8300
Guiding off-axis with a 402 mounted using a MOAG.
Paramount ME Mount
William Optics FLT98
CCDSoft / The Sky X / CCDStack

Here’s a photo of Messier 10, a globular cluster in the constellation of Ophiuchus.

Messier 10 - June 3rd, 2011

Photo Details
4×10 Clear Filter / Total Exposure Time 40 minutes
Camera SBIG ST8300
Guiding off-axis with a 402 mounted using a MOAG.
Paramount ME Mount
William Optics FLT98
CCDSoft / The Sky X / CCDStack

The U2 360 concert was amazing. SPACE was one of the dominant themes. The show started with David Bowie’s Space Odyssey and ended with Elton John’s Rocket Man. At the beginning of the show they cut in video of an astronaut on the international space station. They cut in video of more astronauts at the end. The stage looked like a UFO. This show was all about space and in that way profound, especially for me.

Bono modestly pointed out that 8 million lives have been saved as a result of 2 programs that he has pioneered and we Americans have supported. That was pretty awesome. He called on everyone in attendance 80,000+ people to give back to the world. It was inspirational.

The concert started like an encore with lots of old time favorites belted out in the first 10 songs, including Pride and I still haven’t found what I’m looking for. The music selection seemed to gravitate around the album Actung Baby which celebrated its 20th anniversary this year. I think they played nearly every track on that CD. Bono was very proud of their influence on the politics of that time and the end of the Cold War. He said the album was in fact a celebration of the war’s end.

Bono thanked George Bush for assisting with efforts in Africa and did not utter the word Obama or pay any homage to our current leader. I thought this was interesting because in the first U2 concert I ever saw, (Zoo TV) he called the White House at every show until he finally got through to the President (Bush Senior).

The space tie in makes sense. This is our future. This is our evolutionary purpose. Only when we look on the Earth from space do we realize how petty and silly our current conflicts and differences are. Only by challenging ourselves to go beyond our own planet can we be elevated to a higher level of thought and existence.

Here’s a time lapse video of about 1400 pictures we took at the concert.

Here’s a photo of the Globular Star Cluster Messier 15 located in the constellation Pegasus. Estimated to be 13.2 billion years old, M15 is one of the oldest known star clusters.

Messier 15 - June 2nd, 2011

Photo Details
18×10 Clear Filter / Total Exposure Time 180 minutes
Camera SBIG ST8300
Guiding off-axis with a 402 mounted using a MOAG.
Paramount ME Mount
William Optics FLT98
CCDSoft / The Sky X / CCDStack

Here’s an astrophoto of NGC 6960 from a couple of weeks ago. Also known as the Veil Nebula, NGC6960 is a cloud of heated and ionized gas and dust found in the constellation Cygnus.

The Veil Nebula NGC6960 - May 31st 2011

This is the second in a series of test photos that I took during the last new moon phase at the beginning of June. I was testing and improving various aspects of the system. Most of the photos shot during this period were black and white mainly because I was working on other issues at the time, like: tracking/polar alignment, guiding, focusing/image correction, flat/dark calibration and learning new software and techniques. It was a very productive week.

The photo does suffer from a few problems including: imperfect guiding and distorted optics, especially at the corners of the image. This seems to be one of my last major hurdles and requires getting the field flattener set just right. Part of the process of improving the pictures is identifying specific imperfections, understanding why they exist and then acting to formulate solutions to the challenges. Despite these problems, I’m still happy with the image especially since its only the second photo I’ve taken with this new camera system.

Photo Details
5×10 Clear Filter / Total Exposure Time 50 minutes
Camera SBIG ST8300
Guiding with 402 & Piggy back guide scope
Paramount ME Mount
William Optics FLT98
CCDSoft / The Sky X / CCDStack

Globular star clusters are one of the many fascinating things you can image in the night sky. These clusters are the place where stars are born by the 100s of 1000s. M13 also known as Great Globular Cluster in Hercules boasts over 300,000 stars.

I have been setting up / testing / learning some new equipment and software the last few months and this is the first image I have created from the new rig. I still have some things to work on, but we’re getting there.

Messier 13 - May 30th, 2011

Photo Details
LRGB 60x40x40x40 / Total Exposure Time 3 Hours
Camera SBIG ST8300
Guiding with 402 & Piggy back guide scope
Paramount ME Mount
William Optics FLT98
CCDSoft / The Sky X / CCDStack