Hello all, As some of you are aware, Tom Bootland, the owner of the property in Stewartville (past Arnprior) which has graciously permitted us to use for dark sky observing, has recently passed away. It was for us a surprising and very sad news. Tom has given us access to his property for the past 20 years, and every year, he has maintained/mowed large grassy area for us to setup and enjoy the sky. In return for giving us, amateur astronomers, open access to observe from Spring to Fall, our presence has helped deter unwanted trespassers. I have since been communicating with his wife Charlene. Charlene would like to continue to grant us access to the property, and her two sons will continue to mow the field on a regular basis. As always, the maps and instructions for access to the site are available in the groups files section. If you have trouble getting to them, please let me know and I can share them with you privately… https://groups.io/g/oaog/files/Maps/Bootland%20Farm Tonight, I will be heading out to Bootland Farm for some post moonset observing from about 12am to 4am. A few of you have mentioned interest during the RASC meeting and I thought I would the group know in case others are interested in joining us! I plan to do mostly meteor observing but I may bring my new’ish TV np101 and try out new eyepieces. And also take a few images. There is plenty of room for a good number of cars and setups at the field. If you would like to join us, do bring plenty of mosquito repellent as I expect the warm night will be very buggy. Bring also good boots or tall water resistant shoes as the field might not yet be mowed. Clear skies! Pierre

I'm a bit late to the party posting this but I thought I'd go ahead and share another take on the 2024.Apr.8 Eclipse. There are some bookmarks in the video description in case the video feels a bit long: https://youtu.be/U4Igt51zgrQ Taken in Murphysboro, IL with Sony a6500, Williams Optics Zenithstar 61, on a poorly-daytime-aligned Celestron AVX mount. Murphysboro is very close to Carbondale, IL which was the crossover point for the 2017 & 2024 eclipses. They sold stickers saying: "Twice in a lifetime". We had a really good time camping at the Big Muddy Brewery for 4 nights after doing a u-turn on our way to Texas and heading to IL instead. Thanks for watching! Peter.

Hello all, Séraphin-Marion school would like to know if a telescope volunteer (or two) would be available to setup a solar observing session for their students for about an hour on June 5th, from 11am to Noon. This would be a great way for all the students to highlight their school year's astronomical theme about the Solar System. If you are available, please let me know (meteorshowersca at yahoo dot ca) and I'll put you in touch. P.S. The school's direction was very happy and thrilled that Xavier participated at the garage sale event on May 25th. Thank you Xavier! Cheers! Pierre

Hello all, We received a request for outdoor telescope support (solar observing) during the daytime for a students garage sale event at Séraphin-Marion school in the east end this Saturday May 25. I am awaiting confirmation on the time, but I believe it is ongoing from morning to afternoon, and the timing and duration for telescopes is flexible. They would be more than happy with any kind of support available and ideally would like to know roughly when telescopes would be setup, for planning purposes. If you are interested in volunteering, please let me know and I'll put you in touch with the organizer. Thank you! - Pierre

I think the sky will continue to clear. Feel free to join us showing the public lunar craters tonight at 20:30 at the sidewalk in front of !ngigo bookstore in kanata centrum. attilla danko, https://www.cleardarksky.com/csk, danko@..., attilladanko@...

It's way to cloudy to so solar at 18:00 today. There is a chance we can do lunar only at 20:30. I'll make a go/nogo call at 19:30. -ad

Good morning everyone! Happy International Astronomy Day! We hope you are as excited as we are for today’s event at east end Chapters near Ogilvie road ! Here’s a weather update… The rain has ended but we expect a good amount of cloudiness to linger this morning, as we gradually setup on site. By early afternoon (about 1pm onwards), the frequency of clear skies is expected to increase, and we hope to be able to do solar observing. There is a small chance of a scattered thundershower by mid afternoon. I would recommend bags, tarps or blankets to cover equipment just in case we get some precipitation. Otherwise, by about 3pm onward, it is expected to be mostly sunny and clear! The numbers of telescopes and displays will likely increase as the weather improves throughout the day. Mostly clear skies are expected this evening and tonight for our main observing session until 10pm! Temperature high this afternoon is 24C, therefore we recommend wearing a hat, putting on sunscreen and having plenty of fluids if you’ll be staying a while. So to recap, weather should gradually improve as the day goes on. We will setup on site gradually a bit later this morning. And we expect a nice sky this afternoon and evening! Looking forward to seeing you there! 😀😛🌖 - Pierre

As Pierre has announced, there will be a large star party at Silver City, Gloucester for astronomy day today. I suggest we also offer the west end a star party. I suggest we bring scopes to the sidewalk in front of !ndigo book store in Centrum Kanata (formerly Chapters bookstore). I suggest we start at 18:00. We'll be able to show the daytime moon and sunspots at the same time The moon will just about clear walkmart then 12 degrees up. The sun will be about 24 degrees up. 3 people have offered to bring scopes. So we are go. The sidewalk has room for about 7 to 9 scopes so more are welcome. See you tonight. attilla danko, https://www.cleardarksky.com/csk, danko@..., attilladanko@...

Astronomy Day is a GO for Saturday!(tomorrow). It was a tough decision as there are fewer clouds forecast for Sunday, but more volunteers are available for Saturday. Please come and join us for a free public star party at Chapters Silver City, 2401 City Park Drive, Ottawa. Some volunteers are also interested in doing Sunday as well, so we will discuss that in person tomorrow. Setup time might occur a bit later in the morning, as soon as the rain showers have ended. We hope to see you there! All are welcome! : ) Cheers! Pierre Media Advisory - For immediate release The Ottawa Valley Astronomy and Observers Group (OAOG) proudly presents: INTERNATIONAL ASTRONOMY DAY FREE Outdoor Family Event! Saturday, May 18, 2024 from 10 am to 10 pm Silver City Gloucester, Chapters parking lot, 2401 City Park Dr. (near Ogilvie Rd) Meet local amateur astronomers and learn about the wonders of the night sky! See telescopes of many different sizes and types, and find out how they work! Check out live video-imaging and look for our displays and free informative handouts! In case of poor weather, we will hold the event on Sunday, May 19. Follow our websites (links below) for weather updates. Further information: facebook.com/OttawaValleyAstronomy Free online discussion group: groups.io/g/oaog Contact person: Jim Thompson top-jimmy@... Contact person: Pierre Martin meteorshowersca@...

I've listened silently on this chat group ever since I talked to some of you one evening at Kanata Chapters. I just wanted to let you know that Tom Bootland passed away Tuesday. I've known Tom since high school. We both went to University of Waterloo for a BMath CS degree. We even roomed together the first semester. I thought I should let you know since some of you made use of his offer to use his land in Stewartville. If interested you can find service details at https://www.zohrfuneralhome.com/. Regards, Dalton Campbell

Saturday May 18 is "Astronomy Day". The OAOG with the Ottawa RASC are planning a big sidewalk session at Chapter's booststore at silver city in Gloucester. Anyone want to do a smaller sidewalk-astronomy session at Chapter's bookstore in Kanata Centrum? Actually, the cloud forecast for Saturday does not look good. I suggest Sunday is more likely (Sunday is also the OAOG's backup date.) Since Jupiter is in the same direction of as the Sun, we will have only craters on the moon and sunspots on the sun to show. So I suggest an afternoon session as we could show both the moon and the sun at the same time. (Daytime moon often amuses the public since many don't realize the moon is visible during the day -- even though the contrast is lower than nightime moon.) Experience says we should arrange for at least 3 telescopes. who is interested?

======== AURORA ALERT. No less than 5 Coronal Mass Ejectas are heading to earth from the large sunspot group I posted yesterday. This has the potential of being a severe geomagnetic storm and hopefully dazzling displays of Northern Lights tonight. https://www.spaceweather.com ========

For those who didnt drive hours to get to the path of totality and are wondering about "what's the big deal", this nerdy cartoon sums up the difference between partial and total solar eclipses: <https://xkcd.com/2914/>

Anyone up for resuming dining pre-RASC meeting?