Happy Friday, everyone!
Have you tried the new voiceover option at the top of this post? Speaking of voiceovers, if you’ll pardon the pun…it was my grandma’s 97th birthday yesterday. Dad sent a video of her taking a lap with her walker. I had to give it some “X Games” narration, announcing it as…The Gram Games! (If I get her permission, I’ll post it, but until then, just picture speed metal in the background as I announce the walk. Effort exerted is effort rewarded, in my book!)
No wonder I’m behind on my to-do list!
And now, it’s time for the weekly observing report, and some treasures from Earth!
If you’re just joining the fun, Fridays feature a new section dedicated to transcribing stargazing into “Alternate Text” - something the Blind and Low-Vision might enjoy - and you might, too!
Howdy, Neighbors: Waving to the Andromeda and Pinwheel Galaxies
Some observing sessions are like attending weddings out of state, complete with packing, lists, and an arduous journey.
But sometimes, the spontaneous look up is the most fun, like a neighbor dropping by for coffee. So it was the other night when I woke up for a snack. The Andromeda and Pinwheel galaxies joined me.
Specifics: The time was 1 am. The refrigerator was rather disappointing, but the skies were clear. I grabbed some binoculars, and stole outside.
Simple Description: I could dimly see the concrete patio, and looking up, was treated to a clear, starry sky. Jupiter shone the brightest, Saturn had moved towards the West, and the fall constellation of Taurus the Bull made a V shape in the Eastern sky. Reddish orange Aldebaran, a red giant star, was a good neighbor next to brighter Mars, also in that part of the sky.
Directly overhead was the constellation Andromeda. I aimed my binoculars, and sure enough, there was a faint, fuzzy blur of The Andromeda Galaxy, also known as Messier 31. The glow was oblong, and looked cloudy.
Scanning downwards with the binoculars, I spied another glow, roughly twice as faint.
It was our other neighbor galaxy, Messier 33, sometimes called The Pinwheel Galaxy. Astrophotos show both galaxies to have a spiral shape. Although they are spinning, they’re so big, they take hundreds of millions of years to complete one rotation. To a human, they look still.
Some Details:
So what about this glow of the Andromeda galaxy? What is it? It’s the light of the galaxy’s trillion stars, shining across 2.5 million light years of space. Although it sounds far, and it is, it’s our nearest major galaxy neighbor. If I paid close attention, I noticed the glow seemed to have an edge on one side, while the other parts of the cloud just faded out into the dark background of space. This is the galaxy’s “dust lane”, and shows up as a distinct line in photographs. I’ll have to see about 3D printing it.
As I looked through the binoculars, I admired the multitude of stars glittering in the view. These belong to our galaxy, and we’re just looking through them to see across space. If being on Earth is like sitting at our kitchen table, and the Andromeda Galaxy is the neighbor down the street, these “foreground stars” are like the shrubs in our own yard that we look past.
Why Binoculars?
Anything that gathers more light than the human eye lets us see farther. Binoculars can reveal much fainter stars than the eyes alone. To hear this effect, cup your hand to your ear. Note how it “gathers” more sound? This is roughly how a bigger lens on a binocular or telescope will let the observer gather more light. The bigger the lens, the more the light gathered, and the deeper into space the observer can see.
On Twinkling Stars
I heard from a blind reader last week, and they had a question about twinkling stars. The stars tonight shone steadily. They all looked like little pinpricks or holes in the sky, the brighter ones looking like bigger dots. When the hurricane was approaching last week, they were wavering a bit, just like someone’s voice might shake if they were scared. Another way to imagine it would be if you’re holding a glass of water in a moving car. It’s not entirely stable. When at rest, it’s calm.
We’ll revisit this topic, too. It’s a fascinating one, and aesthetically beautiful, be it visually, with sound, or with a description.
Good Company
It was nice to wave hello to our spiral galaxy “neighbors”, millions of light years away. The starlight was beautiful, and the thoughts of the cosmos refreshed me. I crept back to bed as the the mighty spirals kept watch high overhead.
Treasures from Earth
The Andromeda galaxy, for it’s trillion-sun mass and mind-boggling distance, is a delicate sight. A perfect pairing for our Treasure from Earth this week is Beethoven’s 4th symphony. It’s sometimes described as a slender nymph standing between two giants (the 3rd and 5th symphonies), and resonates nicely with the gossamer haze of the Andromeda galaxy.
Enjoy Leonard Bernstein leading the Vienna Philharmonic in this performance of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Symphony no. 4 in Bb major, Op. 60, composed in 1806, and recorded here in 1978.