Comments on: Supernova update: it's peaking now!

By: One Writer’s Tribute « Galileo's Pendulum

One Writer’s Tribute « Galileo's Pendulum — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 14:47:42 +0000

[...] some posts to this blog, so stay tuned! His area of expertise is supernova explosions of the type recently observed in the M101 galaxy. Lack of expertise doesn’t usually stop me from writing, but if I can get a real expert to [...]

By: The Fold and the Flock: The Pinwheel Supernova and the August 23rd Earthquakes « New Wineskins

Sun, 11 Sep 2011 21:01:11 +0000

[...] has continued to increase in brightness by 6-20X daily since that time, with peak brightness occurring now, this weekend (roughly Sept 9th to 12th) — the same time that several solar Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) have hit the Earth (creating [...]

By: kuhnigget

kuhnigget — Sat, 10 Sep 2011 02:28:42 +0000

@ mttthetubeguy:

Uh, yeah, but you LIVE IN NEW ZEALAND.

By: Messier Tidy Upper

Messier Tidy Upper — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 17:35:23 +0000

@ MattTheTubaGuy : So what’s your latitude then?

I’m at 35 degrees South.

By: MattTheTubaGuy

MattTheTubaGuy — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 09:36:53 +0000

This is one of the few reasons it sucks living in NZ: I can’t see anything above 45 degrees north.
according to my smart phone, Ursa Major is literally right underneath me!

By: ChazInMT

ChazInMT — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 07:02:05 +0000

Tonight I had a 8″ Schmidt with go to capability, or I never would have been able to discrern 101. 2011fe was the only thing you could see against the very faintest hint of a galaxy behind, moonwash was very bright even in our dark sky location at 6,000 feet. Binoculars my butt. Very cool though to see.

By: cong

cong — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 06:43:10 +0000

@Rodrigo (43)
Considering the typical life span of stars, a few weeks is an explosion. Boom!

By: cowtreat

cowtreat — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 06:15:58 +0000

I went out tonight and couldn’t see it with my 12″ dob. I saw it 3-4 days after it was discovered and it was a lot dimmer than it is now but now the moon is too bright. I’m sure I saw it tonight but I’m not sure what blob it was as I couldn’t see the galaxy.

I was wondering about all these news reports that said people could see it with a good set of binoculars. Did they know about the moon?

By: Rodrigo

Rodrigo — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 23:09:13 +0000

Why does it shine for weeks? Is it exploding all that time?

By: Joseph G

Joseph G — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 21:23:20 +0000

@40 Jose Abel: How much are you looking to spend? I’m an utter n00b myself, but I have been doing a little research on telescopes. Celestron and Meade both have some good ones in the 6-10 inch, 300 – 500 US dollar range. Of course, you can probably do just fine with a basic 4 inch Newtonian, without a fancy mount, for less. It seems like the scopes with the built-in “Go to” feature start in the 350 dollar range. I gather it also depends on what you’re planning on doing – solo gazing vs with groups, eye observing vs photography, etc.

Heh, I thought this was a good ‘scope, but the link is broken. Still, one of the best 404 pages I’ve seen in awhile:
http://www.telescopes.com/telescopes/dobsonian-telescopes/10inchdobsonianreflectortelescope.cfm?nt_id=2&url=http://www.telescopes.com/?aid=19373