Horncastle Astronomy Weekend

[Bassinghamobservatory]

Horncastle Astronomy Weekend was attended by over 70 delegates, including me and two other members of Lincoln AS. I have been going to HAW for several years now and it is always a very enjoyable event with the bonus that it is not very far from home. Distance does not deter a lot of the attendees and many stay in B&B's nearby, but Lincolnshire is well represented. Unfortunately this year's dates clashed with the BAA autumn weekend meeting in Dundee so there were a few of the regulars missing.

 

The village hall at Minting was being used for the first time and it  is a great venue with a good size hall with stage, a bar and parking. It is a tiny village a few miles from Horncastle and enjoys fairly dark skies; could not judge too well with the moon being around but looks promising. There is a hard area on the south side of the building overlooking a sports field with a really good south horizon. They have the hideous floodlighting usually found at such venues but Paul Money had made sure that they would be off for observing in the evenings.

 

The speakers all did a great job. Alan Chapman is a regular here and always amazes with his knowledge and way he speaks non-stop for 30 or 40 minutes without notes or slides. He also has a great sense of humour and there is always some lively banter with Paul Money. Peter Rea is also a regular speaker at HAW and he specialises in space exploration subjects, this time the Space Shuttle. Peter also teamed up with Barry Watts for a Victorian-style presentation using a Magic Lantern. Mr Rea and Mr Watts were dressed as Victorian gentlemen and their 'man', Todd, was the projectionist. The projector was an original Magic Lantern that had been restored by Barry and they used some lantern slides the Peter had been given some years ago. They also used a digital projector and showed the modern equivalent images alongside on the screen. Barry presented the old slides with a few latin phrases as well and Peter described the advances we have made since. Fascinating and great fun.

Mary Spicer spoke about atmospheric effects of the Sun and Moon and later about creating star trails. I had been a bit sceptical whether there would be enough to make good talks out of these topics, but found them interesting and now plan to have a go myself. Dave Eagle's Rosetta talk included many stunning images of 67P and was presented in a most entertaining fashion. I always enjoy the Observations Showcase when delegates show some of their own images taken in the past year. As usual there were some super images and movies including the transit of Mercury, lunar eclipse and aurorae as well as the moon and dso's.

 

Friday evening was cloudy so time to spend in the bar, but Saturday it cleared up after pouring down most of the day. There were several scopes set up outside, some were imaging and others just looking at the moon or dso's. I had a view of the ring nebula through a 16" dob and whilst at the eyepiece a meteor flashed through the centre of the field. Sunday was just that and a couple of solar scopes were set up outside. As shown elsewhere on this forum there wer some fabulous prominences. At the same time there was a hedge, a loop, a tree and a detached prom. There were noticable changes in only a few minutes. Would love to have an Ha scope but it is a big expense to view one object.

 

Food was provided by an outside caterer and they did an excellent job. Good quality and more than I could eat.

 

If you think you would like to go to HAW 2017 book early because attendance is limited to 80 by the size of the venue. Contact Paul to make sure he sends you an application form for next year. http://www.astrospace.co.uk/HAW.html

HAW.pdf

HAW p3.pdf

HAW p4.pdf