winter

Upcoming programs….

Admin CuyAstro , , ,

The Cuyahoga Astronomical Association (CAA) does not hold a General Meeting in December but that doesn’t mean nothing is happening over the winter months! Here are descriptions of programs planned for the CAA’s upcoming meetings:

January 8, 2018
“Journey to Another Solar System!”
Research astronomer and host of WKYC’s “In The Sky” Jay Reynolds will discuss how scientists are working now on a project to send high-speed probes to our nearest star (beyond our own Sun), with data results in less than 40 years of launch!

February 12, 2018
“Parallax: How we measure the distance from us to the stars!”
Club member and self-professed astronomy nerd Tim Campbell will follow Jay Reynolds’s January presentation by showing how through history, humans used cleverness, a basic principle of vision, and a succession of instruments to go from calculating the throwing distance to food to calculating just how far away those little dots in the nighttime sky really are!

March 12, 2018
“Astrophotography and other Cool Pictures”
Club members Alan and Gale Studt will present photos featuring starry night landscapes, panoramas, and star trails blended with earthly landscapes! For the technically curious, Alan will go over his gear and basic procedures. Plus music and more!

May 14, 2018
“The Inflationary Hot Big Bang Theory”
The universe is 13.7 billion years old and our best current understanding of the its origin is called the Big Bang Theory. Gary Kader, Director of the Burrell Memorial Observatory at Baldwin Wallace University, will present a lecture on the science and history of the Big Bang Theory, taking us back to within a trillionth of a second after that beginning.

June 11, 2018
“Telescope Show and Tell”
Tonight various club members will display their favorite telescopes and explain why, how, and “how much!”

CAA’s monthly meetings are held on the second Monday of every month (except December) at 7:30 PM at the Rocky River Nature Center; 24000 Valley Parkway; North Olmsted, Ohio, in the Cleveland Metroparks.

Pillars of the Sun

James Guilford , , , , , , , ,
Photo: Brilliant sky with a sun pillar rising over trees. Photo by James Guilford.
A sun pillar rises into a firey December morning sky.

In the mornings and evenings of the cold seasons we are occasionally favored with glorious sunrises and sunsets. A few of those beautiful moments boast something beyond colored clouds and sky; they host sun pillars! Unknown Object

Sun pillars are the result of low-angle sunlight reflected from flat plate-shaped ice crystals suspended high in the air. Pillars can extend from approximately where the Sun sits, near the horizon, to points straight up and high above.

Monday morning, December 13, presented one of those fleeting moments as I drove to the office. I hurriedly pulled into a parking lot, extracted my camera from its case, and shot a few photos of the beautiful sky. A few minutes later, with the Sun slightly higher and the clouds slightly heavier, the fiery colors had faded and the sun pillar was gone.

Pillars, such as I saw, can also occur at night in the colder months. Lights from streetlamps, parking lots, buildings, and so forth can be reflected by atmospheric ice and produce delicately beautiful light pillars that are often mistaken for auroras.

So as you start or end your day, take the occasional glance at the sky. Perhaps you, too, will see the pillars of the Sun!