May Meeting & Star Party – In Brief

Having decided to skip April due to the extended Easter Holiday and College schedule, the final meeting before our summer recess will be May 16th and not the 2nd as planned originally.  Unfortunately, the College were unable to offer the May 2nd date, and after some tenth hour deliberations, the last remaining viable date was May 16th.  (Mark is away for the 9th) 

Venue as usual - Normanby Campus (formerly Whitby College) Caedmon College - room H1 from 19:30hrs. May 16th. 

If you are new to the area and would like to join the society or have become interested in the night sky and want to take 'one small step', please do come along, you will be very welcome.  Meetings end by 21:15hrs. 

Open nights at the Bruce Observatory ended at the end of April, with yet another cloud-out to end a miserable run of failures.  It is amazing and baffling, just how many Sunday evening dates have fallen foul to the conditions - usually cloud.  Since late October, just 4 successful observing sessions have been possible, pathetic really.  But some years that's just how it goes.  Let us hope the weather improves for the summer star party season. More on this at the May meeting.  

The lighter months always present a problem regarding public observing at star parties.  With only Venus and Mars to view, we shall schedule events around when the Moon is visible.  This pretty much entails just a couple of events per month until August. 

There will be one scheduled event in May – on Friday May 26th (bank holiday weekend)  This will be a lunar star party, perhaps with a solar twist if sunspots are visible.  Location - Whitby West Cliff - Cpt Cook Headland area.