HAL NEWS Plus Star Party and Outreach Reports
April 4, 2018 HAL Members Only Star Party
Weather reports earlier in the day were mixed but ten members believed in the group observing together with good weather. We setup around HALO and waited for the sky to darken and clear, oh did it clear. We were treated to final views of the winter constellations, the ISS fly over, and Venus. Then, we started to take in star clusters and galaxies as the night continued. Some light clouds starting to come in around 11 so we called it a good night for observing and packed up.
Chris Miskiewicz
April 14, 2018 Solar Observing at Clarksville Commons
A very successful outreach event was held at Clarksville Commons. Bob Savoy and I set up white light and H-Alpha scopes as part of the Center’s Earth Day celebration a week early. Even though there is not much visible activity on the Sun right now, views of our home star still brought wows from kids and adults alike, and we had fun talking about the newly observed coronal hole (unfortunately only visible in UV).
Joel "StarDoc" Goodman
March 24, 2018 First Public Star Party
Whoever said you can not have a great night of outreach and observing with clouds in the sky. The cold weather and snow melting did not hold back the 86+ people from attending last night! The moon was swimming in thin cloud cover but it didn't keep people from observing at the eyepiece.
For many, it was the first view from a telescope and everyone was very impressed with the views of the different craters and contrast along the terminator.
Outside we had three telescopes setup and the Watson shared views inside along with short presentations on all things fun related to astronomy. We all looked up to observe the International Space Station transit which capped off the evening.
Looking forward to another great night.
Clear Skies, or in this case even think cloud cover!
Chris Miskiewicz
March 17, 2018 First Member's Only Star Party
Only three HAL members showed up, I stayed till 5am and got to see Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, Mars and Saturn all in one night.
James Stack
March 2, 2018 Outreach Report
This past Friday night, Bob Savoy, Bob Dutilly, and I represented HAL before and after the family and adult planetarium shows at the Robinson Nature Center. We had a variety of refractors, reflectors, and H-alpha scopes to display and talk about.. We handed out HAL cards to the receptive crowd and touted our public star party season opening on Saturday, March 24th.
For anyone new to HAL and looking for opportunities to conduct outreach besides at our public star parties, the HAL Board accepts a limited number of invitations to be featured as a club elsewhere besides Alpha Ridge. Check the HAL calendar for events the Board has committed to well in advance, or keep an eye out for an email call for volunteers in the days just before an outreach event.
Joel Goodman
Observatory Director | 
