By Joan Mieritz | San Juan Stargazers
The San Juan Stargazers will hold their regular monthly educational meeting on Thursday, Oct. 5, at the Community United Methodist Church on 434 Lewis St.
Use the parking lot and enter at the door right off the parking area. We leave the front doors locked.
There will be a social hour starting at 6 p.m. with coffee/tea and treats. You can bring something to share if you would like, since no one signed up to bring a treat.
At 6:30 p.m., we will have brief team meetings such as telescope, hospitality, new members, education, technology and club perks, if there is a need to continue with plans started last month. If you did not select a team on your membership form, you can pick one and then let Dena know your choice. We would like everyone to be on a team. You can be on more than one.
At 7 p.m., the meeting will begin with a brief welcome. As a result of our club survey, the board decided that our educational programs will be the first thing we do and will start no later than 7:10 p.m. When we don’t have a speaker, the educational part of our program is prepared by Ann Marie Kemp. For the past year we have been studying our solar system.
The title of the lesson we started last month is “Comets, the Kuiper Belt and the Oort Cloud.” We will be looking at what lies at the outer edge of our solar system.
What you will learn is so amazing. This is one of the lessons that leaves us with a sense of absolute wonder.
The second part of our program will include a game preparing us for the coming eclipse. If you want to win, study about eclipses before the meeting. If you are not that motivated, you can still be a winner and learn a lot by participating in this game.
Eclipse events
For those who are not club members, but want to be well prepared for the eclipse, there will be a program at the Ruby Sisson Memorial Library on Wednesday, Oct. 11, from 4 to 5:30 p.m. Solar glasses will be available for purchase for $2.
Mark your calendar for Oct. 14, when there will be an annular solar eclipse call “Ring of Fire,” which will be wonderfully visible here. But, you must use eclipse glasses.
A partial solar eclipse will be visible in all 48 contiguous U.S. states plus Alaska. Pagosa is about 50 miles from the path of the best viewing. We are at about 90 percent. In Pagosa, it will begin at 9:13 a.m. Annularity begins at 10:34 a.m., is at maximum at 10:35 a.m. (the ring of fire) and ends at 10:39 a.m. The partial eclipse ends at 12:09 p.m..
The morning of the eclipse there will be a program at Chimney Rock National Monument. The price of the program includes a pair of solar glasses.
Upcoming meetings
At our November meeting on Nov. 2, Dr. Andy Green, our member astronomer who worked at the Australian National Observatory will share with us his specialty: galaxy formation. That should be so interesting.
Our 11th anniversary dinner and end-of-the-year celebration will be on Nov. 10. The dinner is free for members and will be held at the church. What would make it a real party for you? Share your ideas with a board member.
At our December meeting new members will be getting their blue notebooks filled with tours of the night sky for the year. Members need to find their copy that was given to them last year because we do not have extras and we will complete the pages for the entire year. We will go over how it is to be used, and you can start dazzling your relatives and friends by being the astronomer of your dreams, showing everyone the constellations and other night sky objects that are different every month. Anyone who still joins can get this fabulous and priceless gift, but copies are limited. It was prepared by our amazing member, Judith Jubb.
More about the Stargazers
If you would like to join the San Juan Stargazers, you will also receive Reflector Magazine, which is the publication of the National Astronomical League of which you automatically become a member.
To join both groups and get an excellent astronomy magazine, annual membership is only $25 per family. You can join the club at any of our events or now you can join using PayPal at our website, sanjuanstargazers.org. Check out our recently improved website with much more information and fabulous pictures.
We invite you to join us to learn about and appreciate our unbelievable universe.
