AAAA News Release

LAST Aldebaran Graze - SaturdayMorning 9/12/98
A Near Cassini Graze

This just underscores the rarity of documentation of such an event, and makes it a worthwhile goal. Field work, even though usually left to amateurs such as ourselves, is none the less vital to the over all body of knowledge. The fact that such confounding factors such as weather etc. are true variables in the ultimate frequency with which data are collected, serves to increase the real value of our observations, if and when we are ever able to make and document them. Besides, sometimes a good part of the fun is in the chase itself.

Richard E. Gilder

SORRY YOU WERE CLOUDED OUT DOWN THERE IN TEXAS;
WE THOUGHT YOU PROBABLY WOULD BE WITH THE HURICANE.

We were very successful under totally clear skies near Nashville, TN for the Aldebaran graze; and I got my first video recording (six events) of a graze (let alone a FIRST MAG. STAR to boot) using my SuperCircuits 0.04 lux camera. I got no results on the other two grazes Saturday morning, mainly because we were late getting to the first one (Richard Wilds, Craig and Terri McManus, and Rex Easton were set up at one station for it, though, and got approx. 18 events; they were the only ones who got any good data), AND the moon was pretty low in the eastern sky.

On the LAST (third) graze, I tried to video tape it, but four things happened to cause me to not get any data on the video system: (1) I was again "rushed" in setting up and therefor was a little too late getting the scope on the moon; (2) finally realized while looking at the TV monitor that I was on the wrong cusp and by the time a got on the right one, the graze was pretty much to being over; (3) also realized that I had the sensitivity switch on the backside of the camera NOT set for high sensitivity, and therefor probably would not have recorded the faint 8.3-mag. star anyway because of this error; and (4) I had'nt had any sleep for over 24 hours and at the age of 59, just could'nt even think straight!!

Dunham informed the 24 delegates (the most ever at a IOTA meeting) at the IOTA meeting that there is even another graze of Aldebaran very near Denver, CO in April of 1999, so we will probably have our annual meeting in Denver next year; I had thought that this series of Aldebaran grazes was finished for fourteen years, but I guess not.

Bob Sandy

If your sleep patterns, complexion, and aversion to white light
have your co-workers convinced that you're a vampire ...
You MIGHT be an Amateur Astronomer!