Astronomy.com blog : telescopes, astronomy magazine, observing, David J. Eicher

Deep-sky observing at Rancho Hidalgo

David Eicher — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 15:03:00 GMT

Following the dedication of Astronomy magazine’s observatory, and of Pluto discoverer Clyde Tombaugh’s telescope at Rancho Hidalgo, New Mexico, desert adventure awaited us. Astronomy’s publisher Kevin Keefe had joined me to trek out to visit developer Gene Turner and Loy Guzman, our hosts at Rancho Hidalgo. With the many guests from the night before now departed, we set about exploring nearby attractions surrounding the Hidalgo site — Portal, Arizona, with its Cave Creek Canyon and delightful birds, Turner’s Arizona Sky Village settlement, and some Native American sites near Hidalgo that still sport amazing relics dating to 1,000 years ago or even older.

Editors note: You can see the full image gallery of Dave and Kevin's trip to Rancho Hidalgo in our Online Reader Gallery.

The Chiricahua Mountains are amazingly beautiful, and we stood in awe of the perilous ride up the mountain that holds the 24-inch Cassegrain telescope associated with Arizona Sky Village. After exploring the vistas from that high altitude (much higher than the 4,600-foot desert floor below), we retreated to visit the desert itself.

Kevin and I were astonished to see a tarantula (two, actually) for the first time in the wild. We hiked for an hour and a half to reach a rocky shelf on one of the small mountains close to Hidalgo to find the area inhabited by various Native Americans, including Mimbres, from before 1,000 years ago to about the year 1,300 a.d. Tools and numerous stone chips from fashioning arrowheads and other implements lay abundantly on the sand in great areas of concentration. Inside one complex of caves, we found red and black petroglyphs seemingly telling of rivers, mountains, and long-forgotten messages of the ancient past.

This September we had an extremely late monsoonal flow (pictured at right) that threatened our observing on Friday night. But we stuck with the plan, feasted on a bountiful steak dinner, and then prepared Gene’s 30-inch Dobsonian (pictured above) to go after a laundry list of deep-sky objects. For Kevin, it would be a special treat, his first night under a premier sky with a really large telescope. Memories of M13 as seen with a small reflector at his summer camp way back when aroused comparisons with what we might see, until darkness fell, we had generally clear sky, and M13 was the first object dialed up. “My God!” Kevin exclaimed. It was a stunning view of the cluster, resolved cleanly across the face and with numerous lines of bright stars arcing from the central glow. A nice way to start the night, indeed.

We then gave Kevin a taste of the Sagittarius mainline, the arch of bright deep-sky objects from the galactic center northward. The Eagle Nebula (M16) looked fine, although the dark “pillars of creation” were a little subtle, as the sky was still darkening. The Lagoon Nebula (M8) did not fail to impress, as its star cluster, bright central glow, and rivers of dark nebulosity filled the field of view abundantly. We popped in an oxygen-III filter just to give the image a little more kick, to knock up the contrast. We then skittered over to the Trifid Nebula (M20), whose twin glows of emission and reflection nebulosity were superb. The Omega Nebula (M17) had such stunning surface brightness that it practically blew our heads off.

Not to be lost in Sagittarius and Serpens forever, we scooted up to the Wild Duck Cluster (M11), which was so richly stunning that its triangular shape looked wedge-like, set with the single, right orange jewel in its center. From there we shot over to the Dumbbell Nebula (M27), and by now the sky was getting dark enough to be superb. M27 was so brilliant — the brightest part a complete dumbbell but the fainter “ears” of nebulosity completely filling the object into an eerily glowing oval. It was like a superb photo without the color.

A long list of smaller planetary nebulae followed, many in Aquila and Cygnus, with NGC 6781, NGC 6905, NGC 6804, NGC 7008, and the Ring Nebula (M57) leading the way.

We observed many more objects, although some hopping back and forth around the sky was necessary due to very dark clouds that slowly washed over parts of the sky. The view of the Andromeda Galaxy and its satellites was incredible, the nucleus glowing brilliantly and the dust lanes sharply defined, with rich starfields on all sides of the major action. We took the galaxy question to the other extreme, too, by looking at the distant galaxy NGC 4319 and the nearby quasar Markarian 205. In the end, I think Kevin was satisfied with his first night of dark-sky, big-scope viewing. After lots of looking, it was a cool ending to a hot day in the desert, and we returned to Milwaukee on Saturday in time to get back into rhythm for another week at Astronomy magazine starting Monday morning.

We’ll continue to keep you posted on activities at Astronomy’s observatory and on images made from the facility in the coming days.

Photo credits: Gene Turner (30-inch); David J. Eicher (tarantula and monsoon)

Editors dedicate Astronomy magazine’s new observatory

David Eicher — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 17:05:00 GMT

On Thursday night, September 17, at Rancho Hidalgo near Animas, New Mexico, Astronomy magazine editors joined a group of some 50 people to dedicate the magazine’s new observatory facility and to dedicate Pluto discoverer Clyde Tombaugh’s personal telescope in its new location. Now called Pluto Park, the area of the ranch has been set aside for astronomy education goals by Rancho Hidalgo developer Gene Turner, in conjunction with his large and enthusiastic team of partners, notably builder Tim McShane.

Editors note: You can see the full image gallery of the dedication ceremony in our Online Reader Gallery.

The magazine’s observatory has been a long time coming. When I first arrived at Astronomy as a young, enthusiastic kid from Ohio, there was talk about someday having a dark-sky facility for the magazine for observing, story writing, equipment testing, and remote-control imaging. I recall Richard Berry and Robert Burnham, driving forces at the magazine, talking about such possibilities, but the pressure of producing the world’s most popular magazine on its subject relegated these talks to occasional fits and starts. The day I arrived at the magazine was 27 years ago last Wednesday! Thus, a lesson in persistence! Thanks for making this powerful capability finally happen are due to Gene Turner, Tim McShane, Publisher Kevin Keefe, and Kalmbach executives Butch Boettcher and Chuck Croft.

The observatory will be used for imaging of deep-sky objects and planets, and also Hydrogen-alpha imagery of the Sun. Imaging will be controlled remotely from our offices in Waukesha, Wisconsin. The observatory now contains a 14-inch SCT and a refractor for solar imaging, both fitted with CCD cameras and of course a solar filter on the refractor. You will soon begin to see images made with both telescopes filter into the magazine and onto our web site. Editors will also occasionally travel to the ranch for hands-on, dark-sky viewing with other telescopes such as Gene’s 30-inch reflector.

The moment was a proud one last night, having the dedication coupled with the first-light event for Pluto discoverer Clyde Tombaugh’s reassembled 16-inch telescope (pictured at right), which stands adjacent to the magazine’s observatory. The last time I had used the Tombaugh telescope was more than 20 years ago, accompanied by David Levy, when it was in Clyde’s backyard in Las Cruces. I vividly recall how stunned I was through the whole night observing things with the man who discovered Pluto and seeing him manhandle the big metallic tube so effectively.

We lost Clyde 12 years ago, but his widow, Patsy Tombaugh (pictured at right), arrived on the scene last night and made a terrific impression on the whole assembled group. At age 97, she is still going strong, and she recounted many stories of Clyde, his life, their school days, and their marriage, as well as aspects of Clyde’s research. I stood and listened in amazement. What a wonderful woman she is. Additionally, Clyde’s daughter, Annette Sitze, and her husband, Wilbur, were in attendance. So was a close friend of Clyde’s: ALPO founder and longtime director Walter H. Haas. (ALPO stands for the Association of Lunar and Planetary Observers.)

Several friends and notables gave short talks, beginning with Gene Turner, the head man. Then came a very entertaining remembrance of Clyde by David Levy, Astronomy’s contributing editor and the man who wrote the definitive biography of Tombaugh, Clyde Tombaugh: Discoverer of the Planet Pluto. I then spoke briefly about the Astronomy Observatory and my fondness for Clyde, and Patsy Tombaugh said a few words the crowd very much enjoyed. We then repaired to the sky, which was not cooperating. Indeed, the monsoon season has extended this year far longer than normal, and we had occasional rain as well as scattered clouds and “sucker holes” tempting us with brilliant constellations.

However, Gene Turner, Publisher Kevin Keefe, and I set alarms for 3 a.m. and wandered out to see a clear and amazingly beautiful sky. We observed for a while and have a good prognosis, it would seem, for a long evening of deep-sky observing tonight. Stay tuned for more.

Photos credit: David J. Eicher, editor

On the road: Arizona Sky Village, Day Two

Matt Quandt — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 19:51:00 GMT

Astronomy magazine Editor David J. Eicher filed this report from his trip to Arizona Sky Village:

Friday opened up great adventures on our journey to the Arizona Sky Village (ASV). Senior Editor Michael Bakich and I continued our stay at Rancho Hidalgo, the newest development of ASV creator Gene Turner and his associates. The ranch lies just across the New Mexico border from ASV near the little town of Animas. Gene and his girlfriend, Loy Guzman, have opened their house to us and provided spectacular meals, one after another. These included a large feast for many who joined us Friday night, including well-known astroimagers Jack and Alice Newton. The sense of hospitality and community between the ASV group is really second to none.

Last night we had another amazing round of observing with Gene’s 30-inch Starmaster Dobsonian scope, which I’ll describe in a moment. But before we got to that, we had the day to fill. As it turned out, that wasn’t a problem.

Following a very nice lunch at the cute little Portal Café (where we saw Astronomy for sale), and a visit to a few folks at the ASV site, we returned to Rancho Hidalgo and took Gene’s Jeep over a long, winding, and sometimes perilous road up into the mountains. Descending into a large “bowl” depression with mountains ringing us on several sides, we started off on a long walk up to some isolated rock formations. Gene showed us several caves ancient Native Americans — possibly Mimbres and Anasazi — used as shelter and as community centers at least 800, and as many as 2,000 years ago.

Inside some of the caves and around the rock outcrops, we found dozens of artifacts, mostly stone chips that ancients had worked. To see debris lying undisturbed for centuries is an astonishing thing.

Following our gala dinner, we visited the nice observatory belonging to Adam and Tracy Clayson, our observing friends from Toronto. They have a house at ASV with a 30-inch Obsession scope and an impressive roll-off-roof structure that gets you under the whole sky. The meteors started rolling out nicely.

We moved to Gene’s 30-incher to go after some serious deep-sky objects. We looked at the Perseus Galaxy Cluster, with its high-energy weirdo galaxy NGC 1275. We enjoyed the beautifully bright lenticular galaxy NGC 1023 in Perseus, an underrated object. We then moved on to one of the Holy Grails of deep-sky observing, and saw it well as an amorphous glow underlying a group of tiny stars — the obscured galaxy Maffei 1. Discovered by the Italian astronomer Paolo Maffei in 1968, it is a nearby galaxy lying just a little farther away than the Local Group galaxies.

We then started a run on nearby galaxies including NGC 404, the dazzling little elliptical galaxy lying beside Beta Andromedae; the outlying Andromeda Galaxy satellites NGC 147 and NGC 185 (quite a contrast of shapes and surface brightnesses); NGC 925, the beautiful thin spiral galaxy in Triangulum; and IC 10, the distorted irregular in Cassiopeia that is both a weird starburst galaxy and — at 2.2 million light-years away — a member of the Local Group.

We rifled off a whole list of nebulae, planetary and otherwise, that simply stunned us. Some of the highlights included NGC 1514 in Taurus, a strange shell of gas surrounding a bright central star; Hind’s Variable Nebula, NGC 1554–5, a large, angular mass of nebulosity with a bright, arc-shaped central shell that surrounds the orange star T Tauri; the emission nebula NGC 1491 in Perseus, with its sheaf of gas floating over an 11th-magnitude central star; and a killer planetary nebula, NGC 246 in Cetus. This last one is a keeper: a large, ghostly shell with several bright stars across its face and a dark rim inside, surrounded by an irregularly-shaped, bright and mottled disk that reminded us of a pumpkin (maybe because of the season). It’s a great object.

Pulling into the boundary between night and morning, we kept at it and looked at an array of objects. Some of the best were the under-observed globular cluster NGC 288 in Sculptor and the Veil Nebula in Cygnus, always a spectacular sight.

It’s now Saturday morning and we have another day ahead of us and then another beautiful night of observing. Today we’ll be heading to Hachita, New Mexico, nearby us, where we’ll explore a turquoise mine and a ghost town from the boom days of the 1870s and 1880s, when lead, silver, and copper mining ruled these mountains.

More tomorrow.

Editor's note: Check out our gallery of images from Dave and Michael's trip to Arizona Sky Village.

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