Mississauga Astronomical Society
Thirtythird Meeting
Speaker’s’ Night
Day: Friday, January 14, 2005
Speaker: Dr. Ralph Chou - guest speaker
Space News
Randy Attwood showed showed images from the Cassini spacecraft including Iapetus with its dark side and central ridge. The latest pictures from the Huygens probe had also just come in, with videos, and first pictures from the surface of Titan. Videos of the Delta IV launch on Dec. 21 and the Delta II carrying the Deep Impact spacecraft, Comet Machholz and the Pleides were shown. On the occasion of the 1st anniversary of the Mars Exploration Rover landings, a movie form NASA TV was shown describing these missions.
The E.C. Carr Astronomical Observatory, Past, Present and Future
Dr. Ralph Chou a longstanding member and past President of the Toronto Centre, R.A.S.C. spoke about the acquisition and development of the Centre’s observatory near Collingwood, Ontario.
In the 1930’s, Toronto Centre members observed from the Bathurst and St. Clair area. In the 1960’s and 70’s, observation sites moved to the Metro Toronto and Region Conservation Authorities, and in 1974 to the Schomberg site. Over the years it became obvious that a dark site was needed. Then in September, 1997, Cliff Carr approached Ralph and offered to donate a property to the Toronto Centre. The council visited the site in November and described the property and house. In December 1997, the Toronto centre acquired 45 acres of land and a semi-finished 3 bedroom house with a large garage and shed with the proviso that the property must be used as an astronomical observatory for 40 years. The centre acquisition was announced to the membership in January 1998. Members were extremely generous and donated time, furnishings, dinnerware etc. On May 23, 1998 an open house and official opening were held. In the summer of 1998 a red light system was installed, a library and kitchen set up. After a minor break-in, an alarm system was put in.
A building permit for an observatory was obtained after a presentation to the town of Thornbury. Cliff Carr donated a 16 inch telescope. The observatory was built by a group of volunteers in July 2000. Ralph showed detailed images of installation of the woodwork, electrical wiring, telescope pier and sliding door. By 2001, the observatory was complete with a control room to control computers for the telescope and roof drive. In 2004, work on the basement ceiling was completed and a second observatory was built.
Ralph then described activities at the CAO. Members of the Toronto Centre go to the open house and awards presentation, take part in imaging workshops and astronomy introductions. They have observed the Perseid and Leonid meteor showers and do general observing. There have been visits to the CAO from various groups from universities, astronomy clubs, scout troops, high school classes and the R.A.S.C National Council.
In the summer of 2004, the observatory of Tony Horvatin, current President of the Toronto Centre, was moved by truck to the C.A.O. and installed there by volunteers. The Tony Horvatin observatory, will house its own telescope.
Future plans for the C.A.O. involve installation of the mounting in the new observatory, enabling access for disabled persons, finishing the basement drywall, competing the computer network, organizing centre archives, adding additional facilities such as optical and radio telescopes and organizing professional-amateur collaboration. There is ongoing discussion with the university of Toronto to allow graduate students to use the 16 inch telescope for research, stellar photometry and spectroscopy. Dr. Peter Brown of the University of Western Ontario has established an all-sky sentinel camera for meteor recording and plans to install one of these cameras at the C.A.O in spring of 2005.
Many questions then ensued after this well-received presentation.
Submitted by Chris Malicki,
Secretary
Chris
Malicki, Secretary
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