SCOB - Science Centre OBservatory

OBSERVATORY CLOSED 11TH NOVEMBER

2011-11-01T08:57:00.003+08:00

PLEASE BE AWARE THAT THE OBSERVATORY WILL NOT BE OPEN ON FRIDAY 11TH NOVEMBER.

Total Lunar Eclipse on 15th/16th June

2011-06-09T16:52:00.004+08:00

A Lunar eclipse occurs during an alignment of the Sun, Earth and Full Moon, resulting in the Full Moon gradually darkening as it moves into the Earth’s shadow.

In Singapore, this eclipse occurs in the early morning hours of Thursday 16th June. It is the longest lunar eclipse since July 16th 2000.

Timings
1:22am – Penumbral phase – The Moon enters the outer edge of Earth’s Shadow (penumbra). This shadow maybe light and not very obvious.
2:22am – Umbral Phase – The Moon enters the darker, inner part of Earth’s shadow (umbra). Over the course of an hour, the dark grey shadow gradually moves across the face of the Moon.
3:22am-5:02am – Totality – The Moon is completely covered by the Umbra and turns red/orange in colour.
5:02 – 2nd Umbral phase – The Moon reaches the opposite edge of Earth’s umbral shadow. It begins to reappear as the shadow gradually recedes across its surface.
6:02 – 2nd Penumbral phase – The Moon is completely visible again, although not at full brightness as it is still inside the lighter, penumbral shadow.
7:00am – Eclipse ends – The Moon exits the penumbral shadow of the Earth’s and returns to full brightness. At this point the Moon may be too low to see.

How to observe the lunar eclipse:
Lunar eclipses do not require any special equipment to be seen.
They are easily visible to the naked eye, due to the Moon’s large apparent size and brightness.
Choice of location is important. As this eclipse occurs in the early hours of the morning, observers must have a clear view of the west direction, unobstructed by trees or tall buildings.
Open parks, fields and reservoirs often make good locations.
Avoid brightly lit areas.

Join us at the Red Moon Spectacle Event, at The Lakeside @ Omni-Theatre (Jurong Town Hall Road, besides Snow City).
Bring a mat and observe the eclipse overlooking Jurong Lake, as well as outdoor movie screenings starting from 11pm.

WEATHER WARNING:
In the event of thick clouds and/or rain, the lunar eclipse will not be visible.

SPAstro

2011-01-15T01:23:00.003+08:00

We had a cloudy sky during this evening's Observatory session. But occasionally little pockets of the sky peeped through the gaps in the clouds, exposing the glittering objects behind.

We saw Jupiter, Archernar (star) and the Moon through the telescopes set up.

We had a surprise visit from SPAstro, a bunch of vibrant and lively young people keen on Astronomy. Thanks for bringing your youth and exuberance to the Observatory, and thanks for promoting the love of Astronomy! The Observatory is also so much more colorful now with your help in putting up the color cards.

Presenting: SPAstro!

Hope you have enjoyed your visit. Come often ok?

Rainy Days and Shooting Stars

2010-12-07T10:57:00.006+08:00

Tis the season to be jolly fa la la la la, la la la la.
We're in the middle of the holidays and Christmas is approaching, there's a relaxed atmosphere in the office as most people are clearing leave, thinking of year end parties and planning secret santa gift exchanges, which remains me I must find a good day to pop out at lunch to buy my gift for D-day this Friday.
Of course this does not mean that we scobbers are just sat around the office surfing the internet feeling all merry, of course not no no no... half of us are on leave sat at home surfing the internet or even off on holiday somewhere feeling even merrier :)
For those of us still in the office, its all work work work, there's still shows to perform, visitors to entertains, events and programmes to prepare for, even surfing the internet and this blogpost is work related...-gives oneself pat on back for working so hard-... Although I probably would be on leave now if I hadn't used it up earlier in the year.

Anyways back to work.... at SCOB there's alot of planning to be done. We're currently working on developing a planetarium programme for our friday night stargazing using our new inflatable STARLAB planetarium, which requires further testing but will probably be ready early next year.

Stargazing on Fridays has been severely limited by the rain. December is actually great for stargazing as there are several bright constellations and interesting objects around, its just unfortunate that this period is one of the most cloudiest and rainiest in Singapore.

It was a similar story last month, especially during our big event "The Festival Of Stars" held on the eve of the Hari Raya Haji holiday on 16th Nov. A few thousand people turned up expecting a look at Jupiter through the many telescopes provided by TASOS and SCOB and hoping to stay overnight to witness the shooting stars of the Leonids Meteor Shower.
Instead, we were all witness to a tremendous rain shower:

The observatory and stage area was literally flooded. No stars or meteors visible on this occasion. However, it was decided that the show must go on, as all the outdoor festivities, performances and movie screenings were moved to the indoor auditorium at the Annexe Hall 1, the Science Centre Exhibitions were also opened for all.

At the SCOB, things remained rather quiet, with just a handful of families remaining to participate in the arts and crafts activities. Only thing left for scobbers to do was to regrettably inform new arrivals of the wet weather and usher them to the galleries and annexe auditorium. We also put up a temporary sign to help guide visitors along and reduce the amount of times we had to repeat the information.

Now dare I say that there is another meteor shower coming this December, in fact its happening this very weekend. The Geminids Meteor Shower peaks around December 12th & 13th every year. This year is supposed to be a pretty good one as the Geminid Meteors are expected to be brigther and more numerous than meteor showers in previous months.

Having said that, its best not to get your hopes up. Remember, watching any meteor shower in an urban environment like Singapore will yield a relatively low number of shooting stars. Whereas the expected number of Geminids is supposed to be 40-60 meteors per hour, you are more likely to see one or two per hour, somemore its rainy season so expect more rain than meteors.

SCOB we will not be organising any event for the Geminids. For those who wish to view it from home, it is best seen on the evening of 12th December between 12am and 5am (which technically is early on 13th Dec). Meteors will originate from the North-East direction and can travel in any direction (up, left, right).

If you do manage to see any meteors let us know how many and where from. This Friday 10th Dec on Friday Night Stargazing we'll also be giving a talk at 8:15pm, giving more information on the Geminids and other meteor showers.

Merry Christmas Ho Ho Ho!!!

Festival of Stars - Shooting Stars, Jupiter and Movies!

2010-11-15T13:31:00.001+08:00

Its that time of the year again for the Leonids Meteor Shower. The best time to see the shooting stars will be Tuesday 16th Nov and Wednesday 17th Nov (Hari Raya Haji), between the very late to very early hours of 12am and 5am.

Scanning through various astronomy-related sites, I see that the expected rate of meteors for this year's shower is about 20 meteors per hour. Now, as I'm sure many found out last year, watching a meteor shower in a light-polluted urban environment such as Singapore yields significantly less than the expected number of shooting stars. You will be considered extremely fortunate indeed if you manage to see just 20 meteors over the whole night.

To make matters worst, The Moon's brightness also reduces the number of meteors, meaning you're most likely to see the shower after 3am when the Moon sets.

All it not lost however, The Festival of Stars is here! Science Centre and TASOS (The Astronomical Society of Singapore) have teamed up to provide an evening of entertainment at the SCOB, Omni-Theatre and Snow City on 16th Nov.

Besides telescope viewing of Jupiter and the Moon, there's live stage shows, performances, talks and Movie screenings (Transformers 1 & 2.... i think) into the early hours of the morning, just in case you get bored of looking out for those elusive meteors. Events start at 7pm. Science Centre will also remain open until 10pm.

Festival of Stars - Star Maps and Jupiter's Moons

2010-11-15T12:39:00.007+08:00

Over the past months, you may have seen a very bright star-like object high up in the night sky. That is actually the planet Jupiter.
During the Festival of Stars on 16th Nov, look straight up above your head to see Jupiter joined by a Gibbous (oval-shaped) Moon (see Star Map below):

After midnight, Jupiter and Moon will be low to the ground. In their place high above you'll find the stars of Taurus, Orion and Sirius (the brightest star in the sky). Its at this time that you start to see the occassional shooting star, which originate from in front of the stars of Leo, low to the eastern horizon (see Star Map below). Meteors can shoot out in any direction across constellations like Orion,Gemini and others above left and right of Leo.

Although the meteor shower sets the theme of the Festival of Stars, the planet Jupiter will be the highlight of the telescope viewing. Being a Gas Giant, Juipter is covered by "bands" of clouds. For many years, two dark bands have been the most visible but this year one of the bands (The South Equatorial Belt or SEB) has disappeared, covered by whiter, higher clouds. When will it return? Nobody knows but this past week dark spots have begun to appear in the white clouds and if they continue to spread it could cause to SEB to reappear.
View some of the most recent images of Jupiter and its missing belt at astronomer Chrisopher Gu's website: http://jupiter.cstoneind.com/

Image Credit: Christopher Gu

Also visible around Jupiter will be its four biggest moons - Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. As they are in constant motion around Jupiter, they are in different positions each night. Here are their approximate positions during Festival of Stars 16th Nov:

I love the mooooon!

2010-06-27T00:55:00.013+08:00

Scobbers are just back from STAR+MOON gazing tonight! The widely publicised event for the partial lunar eclipse saw more than 3000 visitors tonight. Thank you for visiting the Observatory!

Enthusiastic visitors under a beautiful evening sky

Yong and our wonderful volunteers

Setting up and making some final checks before visitors use the telescopes...

Attentive visitors enjoying an interesting talk by a NASA professional

Crowds going crazy over the delicious snacks!

After a long wait, we were finally awarded with a glimpse of the beautiful eclipsed moon, peeping from behind the JTC building. When the moon finally rose from behind the JTC building, we used telescopes and binoculars to look at the interesting shadow cast by the earth on the full moon. The shadowed part of the moon looks a bit greyish, and using binoculars, we could make out some details.

Did not get a chance to capture a photo through the telescopes. It looked something like this.

So what did we look at tonight? We were so lucky to get a clear night sky, very very rare given the recent rainy weather. We saw Scorpius, Southern Cross (Crux), Alpha Centauri, Jewel Box, the Big Dipper, Saturn, Venus, Virgo, Libra, Saggitarius and so on. It was an awesome evening.

Some visitors enquired about the Google Sky application on the Android phone. As mentioned in a previous post, it is an excellent tool for stargazing. It is also available for free on the Android Market. So at the moment as far as I know, you have to own an Android phone to use the app. Some examples of an Android phone will be several HTC models, as well as Motorola Milestone, and Samsung Galaxy S.

It was a spectacular night, and I believe many visitors couldn't get enough. Fret not, the Science Centre OBservatory is open every Friday night 8pm to 10pm, and the main telescope in the dome will be opened up for public viewing.

Entrance is free and all members of the public are welcome. Stay tuned, and see you at the Science Centre OBservatory soon!

Note: Title of post is copied from Sponge Monkeys - We Like the Moon. It is so funny. Check out the embedded video below.

The Jewel Box

2010-05-21T15:24:00.009+08:00

In the previous post we talked about an Android night sky application. If you do not possess either an iPhone or Android, an online version is available too.

If the night sky is clear later, we at the Science Centre OBservatory might look at The Jewel Box tonight.

The Jewel Box (N4755) is present in the Southern Cross (The constellation also known as Crux that acts like a compass in the Southern part of the sky). Hardly visible to the naked eye, the Jewel Box is a dazzling cluster of stars through the telescope.

A closer look:

Looking at the Jewel Box is a once a year event, because in Singapore on the Equator, we only get to see it for a short few weeks a year.

To catch the amazing beauty of this star cluster, allow your eyes to adjust to the dark first before you look through the telescope. You should be able to catch a few stars forming an outline of the letter "A".

Good luck finding the Jewel Box tonight! Hope to see you here at the Science Centre OBservatory!

Google Sky Map for Android Phones

2010-05-21T14:40:00.011+08:00

There are plenty of Sky Map apps on the iPhone, but how about the droids? I recently came across a really cool one by Google.

Google Sky Map allows you to explore the night sky just by pointing your phone to space. The screen serves as a window onto the sky, whereby you can explore the relative positions of planets, stars, constellations, and more, in realtime.

In the auto mode, Google Sky Map works just like a compass. As you move the phone, the view on the screen moves. Pointing the phone to a particular star allows one to find out its name. To find out what our fellow stargazers can see from the other side of the earth right now, point the phone to the ground. To find out what is in the sky in the afternoon, point the phone to the ceiling if you are indoors.

If you prefer, the traditional manual mode is also available. Just open up a zoomed in sky map (the whole celestial sphere) and explore by sliding your fingers across the screen.

An extensive database is also available for you to search for a particular object in the sky.

Everytime I play with this app, I am mesmerized by the dazzling array of stars that surrounds the Earth from every angle, and at any time of the day.

If you are holding on to an Android phone, go try it out now!

SCOB Color Wall

2010-04-06T17:52:00.005+08:00

Good Tuesday dear SCOB bleaders!! Thanks for standing by us and coming by to check our blog :) Here are some photos we can't wait to share with you...

The Science Centre OBservatory Colour Wall!!!!

Almost at its completion, the Color Wall is made up by you visitors. Each and every tile (color card) painstakingly created and coloured by visitors of all ages from as young as 3 years old to as young as 100 years old!!) These color cards contain beautiful memories and declarations of love between couples and earthlings for planets/the moon/stars.

Here are some examples.

"I am King"

"I Love Life"

"Love the Earth and Jupiter"

"I would chart the milky way (and) the universe and map it on your heart."

Hope you had a great long weekend last week :) This Friday we will be open again for all visitors.

See you there ok?

Bye for now!

Sky at Science Centre now:

2010-03-19T17:42:00.003+08:00

Slightly overcast with lots of clouds and hints of blue. We might be able to see planets and quite a few stars tonight since it does not seem likely to rain.

See you at the Observatory!

*edit*

Sorry dear readers... It started to rain as the Scobbers were having dinner... The weather is hard to predict indeed! But with a rain this early in the evening, there can be 2 possibilities - It will continue to rain, or it will be very very clear tonight :)

Staying optimistic! See ya~

Astronaut Photography of Earth

2010-03-12T18:09:00.005+08:00

Dear all, long time no see... It's been a busy start of the year for all of us at Science Centre, and we finally made it to March! The Science Centre Observatory will be open as usual tonight, and because it is the start of the 1 week school holidays, we are expecting a surge in visitors. Feel free to come and join us! Our Colour-Wall is reaching completion soon, and since a few weeks ago, visitors have been making their own sundials and bringing them home as souvenirs.

If you have always been a fan of our Omnitheatre movies, Forces of Nature is an upcoming movie all about natural hazards such as earthquakes, tornadoes and volcano eruptions. While doing a research on natural disasters, I came across a really cool website by NASA.

The Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth

Packed with 481,761 rare photographs from the International Space Station, you can search for any feature on Earth, and get a vast list of stunning photographs from their database.

A search for "volcanoes" gave me a list of beautiful volcano pictures, much like looking down on Earth from an aeroplane. A colleague searched for "Tokyo at night", and got this:

For those who love beautiful pictures, or anyone who needs a photo resource of the earth, this is definitely a webbie worth bookmarking.

Februrary's Night Sky

2010-02-05T18:00:00.004+08:00

Below is a star map representing the Singapore night sky in February:

One of the highlights this months is the planet MARS, getting higher and higher above the eastern horizon. If you have binoculars, its great to try and use them to spot MARS this month. The red planet is steadily moving past the open star cluster known as the Beehive Cluster (M44) in Cancer. See diagram for details:

The constellation of Orion is very high and bright in the sky at the moment.

Orion’s seven brightest stars can easily be seen in Singapore’s light-polluted sky.

Betelgeuse (alpha Orionis) is a massive red supergiant that varies in brightness. Bellatrix (gamma Orionis), is blue giant star. Its name means “female warrior”, indicating that Orion may not have always been seen as a male hunter. Bellatrix is the closest of Orion’s stars (243 light years away).Out of Orion’s Belt, Alnilam (epilson Orionis) is the closest and brightest of the three. Rigel (beta Orionis) is a large blueish-white supergiant star. Sometimes it becomes the brightest star in Orion, when Betelgeuse occasionally fades.

Scanning Orion with binoculars or a telescope can reveal many more stars and wonders.
One of the most famous deep sky objects in Orion is the Orion Nebula (M42)

The Orion Nebula is a large cloud of gas (mainly hydrogen) part of which has collapsed to form young white stars.
It is visible to our naked eyes as a tiny speck below Orion’s belt. Binoculars show a hazy glow around a tight cluster of stars.

The diagram below illustrates the view of Orion Nebula through a telescope:

The tight group of four star is known as the Trapezium (theta Orionis).
Surrounding the trapezium is part of the hydrogen gas cloud, which is being illuminated by the energy from the Trapezium stars.
A number of other stars within and in front of the nebula are also visible.
The Orion Nebula is a large cloud of gas (mainly hydrogen) part of which has collapsed to form young white stars.
It is visible to our naked eyes as a tiny speck below Orion’s belt. Binoculars show a hazy glow around a tight cluster of stars.

Friday 15th Jan - Partial Solar Eclipse

2010-01-08T18:28:00.002+08:00

Watch this eclipse at Science Centre OBservatory!
Observatory opens at 3pm
Free eclipse glasses for every visitor

How to view an eclipse
Bring a mat (to sit on)
Bring a hat or an umbrella (for shade)
Wear eclipse glasses (for protection)
or use a Pinhole (we'll show you how)

Festive cheer at SCOB!

2010-01-07T17:24:00.006+08:00

Christmas decorations are replaced with Chinese New Year ones for SCOB spring cleaning today. It was cheerful and merry putting up decorations with my fellow Scobbers. The starting of the year fills one with hope, its such a great feeling :)

Scobbers Andrew and Eng Wen taking down the weather-beaten mistletoe along the stairs.

Christmas decorations to be put away until December!

Scobber Yong figuring out how to use 3M plastic hooks...

Scobbers Eng Wen and Alvin working on a tangled mess of plastic hearts and string...

Scobbers Andrew and Alfred putting up the plastic hearts. Randomness rules!

Scobber Andrew with our new year decorations! The redder and the golder the better.

Scobber Yong putting up more plastic hearts. Scobbers Eng Wen and Alvin working on even even more plastic hearts. Its Valentine's Day on Chinese New Year too, you see.

Scobber Andrew with the untangled plastic hearts

Scobber Yong!

This year's Chinese New Year coincides with Valentine's Day as well. Come to the Observatory with your loved ones and spend a romantic night under the stars!

Reporting behind the camera, Scobber SK.

January Star Map

2010-01-07T10:42:00.005+08:00

If the sky is clear, Janaury is an excellent month for stagazing. Quite a number of the brightest stars in the sky are visible. Most notable, are Sirius (the brightest of all nighttime stars) and Canopus (2nd brightest).
Sirus is the "king of the twinklers". Its bright white light becomes highly refracted as is passes through our atmosphere, causing it to the twinkle more than most stars. You may even see it flash with some colours of the rainbow.

One the highlights is of course Orion. Located almost right overhead, its 7 brightest stars should be clearly visible, including the three stars of Orion's belt. On Fridays we'll be focusing our scopes on a tiny speck in Orion, The Great Orion Nebula, great to look at especially in the big 16" scope, where we can see the tight cluster of stars known as the trapizium and hopefully the glow of the gas cloud that surrounds them.

Of course, I have to mention the return of the red planet Mars to our evening sky.
Probably, visible around 9:30pm, low towards the east, Mars will reach opposition (in direct line with Earth and Sun) on 29th Jan, where it will be at its brightest for the year.

January's Star Map:

Viewing the sun from Science Centre Observatory

2009-12-29T12:59:00.011+08:00

One certain sweltering sunny day in December, Scobbers hosted a group of students very interested in Astronomy. We brought the kids and teachers up to our big 16-inch (40cm) Cassegrain Reflector telescope, where we viewed the sun through a sun filter. FYI: The sun filter looks like a mirror and covers the whole front end of the telescope for safe viewing of the sun by reducing glare.

Sky was clear, there were no clouds blocking our view of the sun, and the resulting image is an orangey sun against a black background. Andrew pointed out some sunspots to the kids, and we caught it on the 2 photos below. Can you see the sunspots at the top right hand corner in the picture?

Viewing the sun in the Observatory dome is a very sweaty affair, and dangerous too. The sun's rays when focused through the telescope, could so easily burn a hole in the dome's carpet, that we better not talk about your eyes. So necessary precautions had to be taken as mentioned above. But it was very different from the usual night sky viewing, and I think you should try it too.

15 January 2009, we are going to view the sun again at SCOB. Time is 2.30PM to 5.30PM at where the Observatory dome is. Why a Friday afternoon!? Because there will be a solar eclipse! Although just a partial one, but a spectacular event to be sure, IF the sky is not too cloudy. Expect the sun to look like a "half-eaten cookie".

As the date draws nearer, we'll post more details on the scob blog.

Hope to see you on the 15th! Meanwhile, Happy 2010!

An Amazing Visual Treat

2009-12-29T12:26:00.007+08:00

Thanks for the recommendation, Terence! This video achieved 8766 five-star ratings on Youtube, and when watching it, I found myself holding my breath, 'cause it was simply awesome.

The Known Universe takes viewers from the Himalayas through our atmosphere and the inky black of space to the afterglow of the Big Bang. Every star, planet, and quasar seen in the film is possible because of the world's most complete four-dimensional map of the universe, the Digital Universe Atlas that is maintained and updated by astrophysicists at the American Museum of Natural History. The new film, created by the Museum, is part of an exhibition, Visions of the Cosmos: From the Milky Ocean to an Evolving Universe, at the Rubin Museum of Art in Manhattan through May 2010. For more information visit http://www.amnh.org/.

Before we close for the year,

2009-12-21T01:24:00.003+08:00

Hohoho, Merry Christmas to all of you, our dear Bleaders (Blog readers)!

Thanks to all of you for your constant support ever since we started blogging this year. It's been an amazing journey so far, we enjoyed writing, researching, linking webbies and photographing for you, but most of all we loved your comments and responses. It kept us going, trust me.

We'll catch up with you again after Jan 1st, and meanwhile, Orion, Canis major the Big Dog, and The Seven Sisters are a delight to spot.

Enjoy Christmas shopping, see you in 2010. *Blowing kisses*

December Star Map

2009-12-02T17:43:00.010+08:00

Sometimes I wonder, is it really worth bothering with astronomy in Singapore? Looking at the night sky over the past few months, I asked myself: WHERE ARE THE STARS?????????????

Every time, I sat down to put together our monthly star map I had to think hard about how many stars to include on the map. Last month, it would have been quite accurate just to include ONE dot on that circular map, i.e. the planet Jupiter, which was one of the few objects who's brightness could break through the bright urban lights and mostly overcast sky.

However, there is no need to despair. The brightest lights of the heavens are fast approaching.It just so happens that October and November were pretty barren months in terms of the number of bright stars available for viewing.

December "should" be a particularly good month for urban stargazing, several of the brightest constellations in the sky are about the appear, for example Taurus, Orion Cassiopeia, Perseus. Cause for celebration indeed but before I get too optimistic, I should point out that we are still in the rainy season here in Singapore and so the likelihood of a cloudy sky is in fact quite......likely. So despite some really interesting objects on view this month we may not get to fully enjoy them.

Having said that, here is December's Star Map, just in case ;)

If we do get a clear sky here's a list of some of the treats on view in my stars of the months:

1)M45 – The Pleiades (Seven Sisters)
A large and bright cluster of young white-blue stars. Try and spot the 7 brightest members using only your eyes. Use binoculars to experience its full glory!
2)The Hyades
A loose grouping of stars next to the bright star of Aldebaran. One of the closest star clusters to the Sun (150 light years away). Requires binoculars.
3)Perseus Double Cluster (NGC 869 & NGC 884)
Two large clusters lying close together in our Galaxy. Must use binoculars but can be tricky to find in our urban sky.
4)Alpha Persei/Melotte 20 Cluster
This large, loose cluster surrounds and includes the supergiant star of Alpha Persei (Mirfak), the brightest star in Perseus. Find it with binoculars or telescopes at low power.
5,6,7. – M38, M37, M36 respectively
Three star clusters located a short distance from each other in Auriga. M37 (no. 6) is the brightest of the three. Containing hundreds of stars they can appear very faint in bright skies

Let's hope for a dry January!

Some recent Fisheye Lomo B&W Pics of the Science Centre OBservatory - Day time

2009-12-02T12:06:00.001+08:00

This Morning's Sky

2009-12-01T06:11:00.001+08:00

It was 5.45am. I could see something real bright outside my window the minute I opened my eyes. It looked like a star, or a planet. But it couldn't be, I would usually need my specs.

And so, this morning, I woke up without difficulty for a change. In fact, I jumped up from bed wide awake, and spent the next 30 minutes trying to figure out the whole beautiful clear dawn sky. Note: I can see a partially obscured view of the Southern sky from my window.

It turned out Canopus was shining through my window. It is the second brightest star in the sky, and is 65 times bigger than our sun, 15,000 times brighter. Thus from my window, this star was easily the brightest one of all, despite being approx 300 lightyears away. It had got to be really bright for me to spot it even without specs.

To the Chinese and the Japanese, this star is also known as 南极老人星, or 老人星 (Star of the Old Man) for short. It signifies happiness and longevity.

To see this in the evening, we have to wait till April 2010. Do drop by SCOB, and we can tell you all about Canopus, and Sirius, the brightest star of all.

Other objects in the sky this morning include our beloved planets Mars and Saturn. Mars was gleaming away above my head looking all reddish and sparkling. Try and catch it tomorrow morning if the sky is clear.

With that, time to go to work.

Good Morning Folks!

New Books at the Observatory!

2009-11-23T09:59:00.005+08:00

We are trying to start an Observatory reference library, and in the past week, some books were acquired on a sale. Before we find an ideal bookshelf, we will meanwhile showcase 2 books every Friday, for your reference when you are taking a break from stargazing.

Do you have books to donate? Bring it down to the Observatory, or leave a message for us in the tagboard on your right.

We look forward to hearing from you! :)

Scobbers go to... Parkway Parade!

2009-11-20T10:20:00.007+08:00

On 20 to 22nd November, our Scobbers Andrew and Yong will be at Parkway Parade, presenting you a most Magical Starry Nights Science Show. Be enchanted by the science demonstrations in the show! Here are the timings for the shows: 1.30pm, 4.30pm and 7.30pm daily.

While waiting, you are welcome to take part in our stage games and who knows what prizes you'll walk away with. The stage games are conducted at 1pm, 4pm and 7pm daily, just right before our science show.

You may be thinking, how to get there?

Here's the information you'll need:

Buses: 15, 31, 36, 43, 48, 76, 135, 196, 196e, 197

Recognise this building with the huge PP and you'll know where to alight.

When you get inside, just look for our nice round Science Centre and our Science in the Mall logos.

If you miss this exciting event, you will have to wait 'til next June in 2010. So make sure you catch it this time. Or it'll be another half-year-long wait.

For more information and updates, here's where to go to: http://www.science.edu.sg/sitm

See you there =)

(and that concludes my very first post)

@ Japanese Garden

2009-11-18T00:18:00.007+08:00

The Leonids meteor shower promises to be a spectacle, one of the rare few in this century. Staff from Science Centre Singapore, Science Centre Observatory and members of TASOS are excitedly gathered at the Japanese Garden.

Have we mentioned the event is free? Walking around the garden, I found a station offering free popcorn and free candy floss too... Yum yum... It's been YEARS since I had candy floss. Used to taste sweet... Now it tastes... Sweet too! Kinda like watermelon.

As feared, it rained earlier. But many visitors were not fazed. I spotted many groups of young people walking to Japanese Garden bringing stools, bags of groceries (picnic? bubblies? :p) and various types of equipment. Looking out of my window now, it has stopped raining. Are you at Japanese Garden now?

Don't worry if you cannot make it to Japanese Garden. Albert Ho from TASOS informed me that the shower is expected to peak between 5.10AM to 6.10AM. Wake up earlier tomorrow, and look WEST.

Here's wishing our dear visitors a great view of the shower tonight, and a beautiful sunrise to watch tomorrow. Sorry I couldn't join you all, I have to work tomorrow...

But some pictures will be posted soon when we go back to office. Stay tuned! :)

Leonids Meteor shower 17th & 18th Nov

2009-11-16T11:13:00.005+08:00

Just some more info about the meteor shower happening this week.
These meteors (aka shooting stars) are tiny bits of debris (ice and rock dust)left by a comet called Tempel-Tuttle, which occassional crosses the Earth's orbit.

On Tuesday night/Wednesdau morning, Earth will move through this comet debris. As the debris enters our atmosphere it burns and creates a bright flash in the sky.

Each flash will last no longer than a second. Between the hours of 12am and 4am (wednesday) you might expect to see a small number of meteors (10 or less per hour).
Approaching 5am, this should increase to about 200 meteors per hour as the Earth enters the densest part of the comet's debirs field.

Remember that being in an urban environment, with brightly lit skies, we may not see the full glory of the shower but if the sky is clear it should still be quite a show.

The shower is called the Leonids because the meteor appear to originate from in front of the constellation Leo (see diagram below). Leo will be visible above the horizon after about 2am towards the East direction.
To watch the meteor shower it is best to have a clear view of the Eastern part of the sky (i.e. where the Sun will rise in the morning). Although the meteors start from the East direction they travel out in all directions so position yourself facing Eastward but kept looking high up to catch the meteors as the streak across the sky.

A star map of the east direction, on Wed 18th Nov 2009 between 3am and 5am:
(Look out for the two planet, Mars and Starn as well)

Scobbers go to... Japanese Gardens and Parkway Parade!

2009-11-15T00:00:00.006+08:00

17 November

Event: LEONIDS Meteor Shower

Location: Japanese Gardens (Chinese Garden MRT)

Time: 8PM to 5AM

Andrew recommends the best timing to see the meteor shower is from 2AM to 5AM. Bring your picnic mats, bring a bottle of champagne, take leave and come bask under the shooting stars (which are not stars) falling at 200 per hour.

With the cloudy weather these days, it's hard to tell how many you will see... But I assure you, it will not be a trip wasted.

At the Japanese Gardens, there will be many exciting activities going on such as movie marathon (Deep Impact and Armageddon), an entertaining Chemistry show, and most of all, don't miss the portable planetarium sessions conducted indoors by our very own Scobbers. Crawl under a huge tent to see a beautiful simulated night sky, learn to identify constellations, and find out why Singapore is the best place in the world for stargazing.

17 November

Event: COSMIC STARDUST (New Game)

Location: Japanese Gardens (Chinese Garden MRT)
Time: 8PM to 12AM

On the same day, at the same place, Scobbers are also rolling out COSMIC STARDUST, a game in collaboration with NYP School of Interactive and Digital Media. Ms Hazel, Ms Melissa and Ms Bee Luan did a grrreat job with the game design and graphics. Its a simple game but really challenging and FUN! Come challenge our high score. :P

Cosmic Stardust

20 November - 22 November

Event: Science in the Mall - Starry Starry Night
Location: Parkway Parade
Time: To be announced

From 20th to 22nd November (Friday to Sunday), Scobbers Andrew and Yong are presenting you with a hilarious and informative Science show about STARS! Do come Parkway Parade and give us support. We are not very sure of the exact location yet... But look out for a huge stage with a Science Centre Logo. That'll be us. Bring your family and friends! Tentatively the show will be on every 1 or 2 hours.

Andrew and Yong are outstanding Science Educators and show presenters experienced with astronomy programmes at the Science Centre. Expect to learn all about stars and constellations, expect to laugh :) After the show, stargazing might just become more meaningful for you, and the universe, more fascinating than ever.

You'll come, won't you?

Promise? :)

See you there!

Cloudy Fridays...

2009-11-14T16:12:00.007+08:00

The weather over in Singapore has not been very ideal for stargazing lately. We had several cloudy Fridays in a row. So our visitors yesterday were having fun attending talks, reading, coloring, looking at the JTC building through our main telescope in the dome.

Last Friday was slightly better. We had Jupiter for starters, and just before the Science Centre Observatory closed, we saw some beautiful constellations!

As we approach the end of the year, there are some nice sky objects to look out for. IMO the easier ones will be Pegasus - a big square in the sky, and the Summer Triangle, a huge right-angle triangle made up of 3 bright stars: Vega, Deneb and Altair. And our favourite would be Albireo, a beautiful double star made up of one blue-green star and one gold star. You need a telescope to see that. :)

Above: Pegasus

Above: The Summer Triangle

Hmm... Let's hope there will be better Friday nights for us to look at Jupiter and the stars... If you are one of the lucky visitors to come on a clear night, don't forget to check out Jupiter and its moons, and their shadows on Jupiter, as well as Albireo. They won't be around for long! Miss them, and you have to wait for 1 year. ;)

If, however, you come on a cloudy night, don't leave just yet, your patience might be rewarded with a gust of wind that clears the clouds in the sky... We are also trying to collect art pieces from each of you. Colour or draw something before you leave, and pass it to us. We are building a picture wall! Pictures will be up soon :)

Meanwhile, feel free to leave messages for us on the Tagboard on the right, enjoy the daily Astro picture on the bottom right, and if you have not added us on Facebook or Twitter, do so now, so that we may update you on the latest news!

See ya at the Science Centre Observatory, friends!

Water on the Moon - CONFIRMED!

2009-11-12T16:36:00.000+08:00

Today's Google Logo above.

Water on the moon has all along been suspected but never proven. But scientists have recently CONFIRMED the presence of water on the moon! COOL.

Here is a short article from telegraph.co.uk:

What exactly has Nasa found?

The equivalent of 24 gallons of frozen water, mixed in with the rock and dust that was thrown into the air when a rocket was deliberately crashed into a crater near the Moon's south pole last month. It is far from the science fiction fantasy of an underground lake, but still pretty impressive for a satellite long dismissed as arid and dull.

Didn't we know there was water on the Moon already?

Scientists have long suspected that there was water on the Moon, but have struggled to prove it. The sensors on orbital craft have detected evidence of hydrogen on the lunar surface, but the quantities were tiny. A major breakthrough came last September, when India announced that its Chandrayaan-1 craft had detected that chemical reactions producing water are still taking place.

Where does the water come from?

No one is certain. One theory suggests that hydrogen released by the Sun in solar winds could have reacted with compounds containing oxygen in the Moon rock, producing tiny amounts of H20. Another explanation proposes that the water came from vapour produced when comets and meteors crashed into the Moon's surface.

What does this all mean?

Nasa has been so keen to find water on the Moon because it brings the dream of a permanent lunar base one step closer. If water exists in the quantities that Nasa now believes, it could be drunk by astronauts, turned into oxygen to make stations inhabitable and – most excitingly – converted into fuel. The Moon could then become the space equivalent of a service station – acting as a staging post for manned missions to Mars.

SCOB is on Twitter! Join us!

2009-10-16T17:32:00.002+08:00

Star Maps - October 2009

2009-10-09T16:27:00.003+08:00

I'm a bit late with the star map for this month.
As usual, the object that will be viewed the most will be planet Jupiter. Still bright in the sky, it will be visible all the way to December.

Regarding other objects in the sky, you might that the night sky looks very barren lately. As we enter the last quarter of the year, the constellations do not contain many bright stars so our light polluted sky makes it very difficult to see the majority of the stars illustrated in the Star Map below.

At SCOB, we will try to find a few interesting double stars and star clusters.
Our constellations of the month include Pegasus (a large square shape of stars) and Andromeda (famous for containing the large Andromeda Galaxy). These constellations should be visible towards the North-East on a night without clouds and without moon.

TONIGHT: Mid Autumn Nite. Free Lanterns and Mooncakes, Special discounts for Science Centre, IMAX Movie and Snow City.

2009-10-02T15:45:00.012+08:00

THE MOON FESTIVAL IS HERE!

Right, the Mid Autumn Festival is just around the corner. There will be a beautiful *almost* full moon tonight, and tonight's Observatory will be very very special...

As part of the International Year of Astronomy's (IYA2009) celebrations, there will be a special mega event at the Science Centre Singapore Observatory, and we hope you can join us! Admission is FREE, as usual. :)

Mid Autumn Nite

The event starts at 6 with a romantic lantern walk from Chinese Garden MRT Station to Science Centre Singapore Observatory. Participants of the lantern walk will receive a *free* lighted lantern. Bask in the warm glow of the candlelight, under an enchanting sky.

On arriving at Science Centre Singapore Observatory, you will receive a free mooncake, while stocks last :) Find the lively area buzzing with stage activities and games, as well as children's hands-on activities. Children, expect to make your own limited edition 3D planetarium to look at stars at home!

From 8pm to 10pm, more than 10 telescopes will be set up all around the Science Centre Singapore Observatory for your viewing pleasure. At the same time, there will be 2 Moon Talks for the scientifically inclined, a high definition movie screening under the stars "The Universe", and of course, a screening of the enchanting Disney Pixar movie, Wall E.

Finally, good news for all of you:

Omnitheatre, Snow City and Science Centre Singapore will all be open until 10PM (extended hours), and at special rates!

Omnitheatre IMAX Movie:

$7.50 Adult (UP: ~~$10~~), $4 Child (UP: $5)

Snow City:

$11 Pax (UP: ~~$13~~)

Science Centre Singapore:

$4.50 Adult (UP: $6), $2.25 Child (UP: $3)

While you are there, check out our new exhibitions: Science of F1, Microbes, Mathematics, and our new IMAX movie: Space Station.

With so much happening at SCOB, what are you waiting for? Come on and join us tonight!!

Tonight's forcast - CLOUD!!!!!!!

2009-09-11T17:44:00.003+08:00

We don't have time to upload a photo of the sky tonight, so let me just describe the conditions.
In addition to a hint of haze, the colour of the sky is distinctly grey, in other words, there is thick cloud covering the whole sky, which has been there since lunchtime does not look like shifting.

To be honest, I do not think we will see any stars or planets tonight:(

Our planetarium is still open for registration but places are limited, meaning once its full it full, apologies if you don't get to see it.

We may have more planetarium in December.

PLANETARIUM SESSIONS 4TH & 11TH SEPT!!!!!

2009-09-02T17:54:00.005+08:00

This September we have a special treat. For two nights only we will be holding a number of 20 minute planetarium sessions during Friday night stargazing at the observatory. The planetarium will be free on 4th Sept and 11th Sept. There will be a registration table at the observatory on those nights, open 7:30pm til 9:40pm.

Just in case you don't know, our planetarium is big, round and dark on the inside. You climb inside it, sit in a circle on the floor and experience a virtual night sky with thousands of stars surrounding you, whilst a nice, friendly scobber describes what some of those tiny dots are. For more detail watch this short video:

September Star Map

2009-09-02T17:28:00.003+08:00

Although it seems particularly cloudy these days, there is still the odd clear night that we can catch a glimpse of some of the bright objects in the night sky.

One object that is hard to miss is the planet Jupiter. Shining high up in the sky (southwards mid-evening time) it is brighter the all surrounding stars. Its often thought to be a star or even a satellite but make no mistake, its a planet, as any look through a telescope would confirm as that bright dot is resolved into a small round ball with visible atmosphere and shining moons by its side.

Sadly, you'll probably need binoculars and a really dark place to see the faint the stars of Capricornus which surround Jupiter this year.

The brightest stars this month still belong to Scorpius and Sagittarius (Looking South) as well as the three stars making up "The Summer Triangle" - Vega, Deneb, Altair (Looking northwards and directly overhead).

Later in the evening and on towards midnight you might spot the four stars that make up the square shape of Pegasus (looking north east) and the bright "fish star" Fomalhaut (looking south east).

Happy Stargazing!

Scobbers and Friends @ Brewerkz

2009-09-01T15:09:00.004+08:00

Alas, September is here and as this new week begins we find an empty space, a gap, a void in our midst. Yes one of our group, our dear scobber Hui Ting "The Ting", has gone, departed, moved on to new pastures.

In retrospect, perhaps I shouldn't have used the word "departed" as it may give the impression that she has passed away but NO!!! Do not worry! Hui Ting is alive and well. What I mean to say is that she has just moved on to a new job, as indicted in the her Memoirs below.

Thanks Hui Ting for all your help at the observatory. Sorry I didn't really provide you with the necessary info to help ease you in, it must have been like getting thrown in at the deep end. I'm glad SK and Albert Ho were there with their great help.
Was Yong really that grumpy while I was away?

I like your Memoirs. I was wondering what you were thinking that orientation day, you were very quiet I remember :0)

Anyways, on the subject of those "liquids". Below are some photos of one of our outings to commemorate the beginning of The Ting's last week at Science Centre. (apologies for the blurriness of the photos, however, this may represent the vision of certain people after the consumption of said liquids :p)

At this point, I must point out that we scobbers are not compulsive drinkers of said liquids nor do we condone excessive drunkenness. We do like to drink such liquids on occasion purely for social bonding, fellowship and for the sometimes delusional ambition of becoming connoisseurs of said beverages.
Motto of the day: Drinking can be good but do so only if you want to and responsibly within your own limits. Also, respect the age limit and do not drink and drive :o)
That said, now on with the photos:
Prior to arrival of "said liquids"

In consumption of "said liquid"

Yong looking like he is in violation of everything I just said about being responsible with "said liquids"

Don't worry folks, he didn't really drink that much, we gave him all our empty glasses. He's just pretending............ or taking a nap, I forget which ;p

I like this photo because it looks like Yong has a transparent head, maybe he feels lightheaded! hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.....I crack myself up sometimes :)

Memoirs of an amateur astronomer

2009-08-29T10:32:00.007+08:00

Foreword: I am really trying to write a proper memoir but I'm currently writing this while being surrounded by technicians and contractors shouting hokien and Malay at each other, so please forgive me if I start punctuating my sentences with f*** and other colourful words. If you find this post too long, just scroll down to the part where it says "In Summary"

So here it goes:

Dear all scobbers,

Today marks my last day here at Science Centre! It's only been 8 months but for some reason it feels like I've been here for reaaaallly long.

The 1st time I saw the observatory was during my orientation, with Andrew as my buddy. I remembered the mouldy smell and the dust and the stuffiness(don't really know if there's such a word) and also the er herm messiness. And I thoughtI would most probably not be involved in the observatory and for that, I was a little relieved=)

But of cos I have to add that the observatory is so lovely and cosy and welcoming now! With aircon! And art works of so many visitors! And it's soooooo neat now after the spring cleaning!

Anyway, after I started working here for sometime, I got roped in somehow. (actually I can't really remember how it all happened except that I responded "yes" to one of andrew's email invite)At that time, I didn't know much about astronomy(in fact, I don't even know the order of the planets then)

And the rest of the memory became abit fuzzy and furry. (I don't think most memoirs are like this but you just have to put up with me)Though, I do remember that I started off being the guest relations officer(nice title I came up for myself hehe) Initially, I felt inadequate because I couldn't answer so many questions (like which telescope is the best, where the black hole is and so on and so forth)

But I'll always remember how I got nearly all my astro knowledge from SK in one session itself, with just her laser pointer and a pair of binoculars. And hearing her explaining the superstitions and significance of stars to certain cultures was absolutely enchanting. That was the first time I really started to love astronomy=)

And I also remembered how Albert from TASOS became my idol, for being so patient and so non-judgemental( he answers my dumb questions with a smile!) And for being so wise and informed in astronomy!

And then Andrew left for UK, which was a traumatising period for me(imagine doing observatory with a moody Yong every Fri, though I think Yong was moody bcos he misses Andrew)

So many people, so many thanks.

In summary:
To Andrew: Thanks for always asking me "Are you all right?" during observatory hahas!

To Yong: Thanks for all the liquids you brought, liquids that I've never tried before until this year.

To SK: Thanks for all your patience and encouragement and for being so giving! You're the sister I always wanted!

To Alfred: Thanks for teaching me how to set up the telescopes and for entertaining me with your jokes and antics!

To Valdrick(don't know how to spell your name) aka Val-val: Thanks for keeping me company! You're the son I want to have in future!

To the cat at the observatory: Meow meow meeeeeeeow! Miao! Meeeeeeee--meee---ow! (Translation: Thanks for letting me pet you! You're the 1st cat I ever petted!)

To Everlyne: Thanks for hmmm hmmmm hmmmm. (pause)I can't think of anything to thank you for. HAHAHAHAHAHAS. All right I thank you for entertaining me during the recent eclipse event=)

Okay this is getting wayyyyy too long. Signing off here!

(PS: I'll be back)

Cheers,
The Thing

Today's Google logo shows this:

2009-08-25T10:53:00.004+08:00

The Galileo's Telescope :)

tonight's sky - 14th Aug

2009-08-14T19:16:00.002+08:00

The sky tonight is.......CLOUDY! There is a familiar dull grey covering across the sky in the picture above, nicely taken by SK at 7:10pm.

Conditions do not look good.
Don't know if Jupiter's brightness can break through at about 9pm

Today's Google logo shows this:

2009-08-12T10:41:00.012+08:00

And that means it is a special occasion, and you should be verrrrrrrry excited.

It is the 2009 Perseid meteor shower!

The name Perseid originates from the constellation Perseus which the meteoroids appear to come from. (The meteoroids do not actually come from Perseus. Perseus is made up of stars light years away, while these meteoroids are only miles away, passing through our atmosphere.) This meteor shower is an annual event which happens every year early August. The Earth passes through rock and dust fragments left behind by the comet Swift-Tuttle, and as these small particles collide with the Earth’s atmosphere, they burn-up, often creating a beautiful streak of light across the sky.

Can we see this meteor shower in Singapore? Andrew says yes☺. Face eastward tonight (slightly to the north) and look high up from 11pm to 5am, it is going to be a wonderous spectacle. But it would require a relatively clear sky and what you see may be affected by the brightness of the moon. As always, the darker the better. Depending on the sky conditions you may see about 10- 20 meteors per hour. The peak time for meteor showers is usually around 2am to 4am.

Note that you need just your naked eye to see the meteor shower, a pair of binos may come in useful if you have one. It is best to have a comfortable chair or mat that you can rest on and gaze at the sky for a few hours.

We wish you luck.

Check out NASA's article on Perseids here.
Source: IYA2009, Sky and Telescope

A short video of what you may see:

August Star Map

2009-08-07T15:21:00.004+08:00

How does Andrew the Awesome take pictures of the sky? and other photos.

2009-08-06T10:52:00.003+08:00

Efforts to get the moon into the frame...

Where's the MOON???

To see this photo taken by Andrew, scroll down to see last Friday's post :)

The Obs Cat peeping at us...

...before retreating into her hiding place.

Yong the Evil Fungi is back from Space Camp!

And finally, a moon photo from a few evenings ago...

Tonight's weather

2009-07-31T19:09:00.003+08:00

Looks good tonight!
Could be our first clear Friday night sky of July.
In the picture above, the whitespeck at the top right corner is the Moon.

Coming Soon in August

2009-07-25T16:53:00.002+08:00

A guide to July's sky

2009-07-25T14:31:00.004+08:00

Travel back to the days of old, when television was new, where things were all black and white. Here, you'll meet "darth" our friendly scobber from " A long time ago..." Who, by means of a mysterious interdimensional hypersubspace rift thingy through the fabric of spacetime, can communicate with us and inform us of what we can expect to see in the sky each month.

The weather tonight (24th July)

2009-07-24T19:31:00.004+08:00

Tonight's sky looks better than last week. Still cloudy but a chance of clearing.

PS. In the end my prediction was wrong. Instead of clearing, more cloud came over and covered the sky. In the few gaps that appeared we did catch a brief glimpse of Saturn and the stars Arcturus (Bootes) and Antares (Scorpius).

I'm sad to say that I don't make a good weather man :(
That's the third week in a row that we've been clouded out. It seems July is a very cloudy month.

Eclipse Event 22 July 2009

2009-07-22T17:08:00.011+08:00

RAIN STOPPED PLAY!!!!
If there was ever a day to remember that in the world of Earth-based astronomy the weather is king, it was today.
Heavy cloud and persistant rain made sure that this morning's Solar Eclipse was well and truly eclipsed, meaning to say that we and many others didn't see a thing.

Despite the rain an estimated 300 or so optimistic visitors came to the observatory at 8:30am.

As our motto says: The show must gone!
Actually, we don't have a motto, but in cases such as this it seemed appropriate.
With no eclipse and no live webcasts we did the only thing we could.......FAKE IT!

Now, when I say fake it, I don't mean use somebody's head and film it moving slowly in front of a bright light, no no no!
I mean we used our trusty software Starry Night Pro Plus to show people an animation of what the eclipse would look like if there were clear skies.

About 100 or so people stuck around for this "simulated eclipse" and a brief tour of the observatory. However, some were a little surprised when they saw just how small a 10% eclipse actually is and also that Singapore will not see a total solar eclipse until the year 2168.

There is a brief video report on the event currently available on Straits Times Razor TV:

Below are some photos of the event:

Above: Alfred setting up live webcast outside classroom.

Below: The webcast showing that even in China there was rain

Above: Yong got his picture in the paper (Lianhe Zaobao) treating visitors to a tour and Q&A session at the main telescope.

The Sky From The Office - Fri 4.52PM 17 July

2009-07-17T16:59:00.004+08:00

Over at Jurong East, the sky is...

Very cloudy and not a tinge of blue!! Hopefully the sky clears up while we Scobbers have our dinner. Not very sure if it will be a good night for stargazing... :/ What do you think?

You can, however, come over and collect a free pair of solar filter eyewear, which you can use to view the sun safely. Remember, on the 22nd of July a partial solar eclipse is expected? Stocks are limited!

See you tonight :)

Scobbers' Pets

2009-07-17T15:05:00.003+08:00

Hehehe here's a glimpse into the interesting pets Scobbers keep in the office...

At time of photo shoot, Andrew was not around. We decided this must be Andrew's favourite Pet:

SK's friend, Oarsome:

Hui Ting's Pet Miu Miu:

Yong looking at his favourite tank:

His pet eel, Eel.

See you tonight!

Scobbers go to Coffee Club

2009-07-15T10:57:00.000+08:00

Well, this wasn't so recent but I was just cleaning up my desktop (that is my computer desktop, not my actual/real desk, which could do with a clean also but it can wait). I appear to be in the habit of saving files in new folders and not bothering to name the folder. As such my desktop is littered with various "New Folder" numbered 1 to 9 and I have no idea what I have in them. Does anyone else do this too?
I would ask you to raise your hand but I can't see you so there's no point, unless you happen to be one of my colleagues here in the office, in which case I shall keep an eye out for randomly raised hands in the workplace, in the hope that someone is reading this blog.

Anyway , where was I. Oh yes! So having opened "New Folder (4)" I stumbled across some photos of previous Science Educator outings, including Yong's birthday and our dear colleague Ms Tian's farewell dinner at Coffee Club IMM.

"So why not put some on the blog" I thought to myself and let everyone know that although we scobbers work hard we sometimes take a break to go eat some cake.
(I was half tempted to write "eat snake" but that would be bad because we never do that no no no :0) Be assured that all this occurred after work hours.
Here's the Coffee Club photos:

SK taking photo of her food. What was that? Fish?

I have to say that I found the food quite ok but my Chicken Zucchini thing was not very filling, which was good as it left room for CAKE!!!

Below are some of our other colleagues (Charissa, Ying Leng, Adam, Dr Her Mann and of course "The Ting" Hui Ting). How come Hui Ting got her food first?

Not sure what our friend Kelvin is doing here.

Perhaps he's talking about a subspace vortex opening up at the bottom of the bowl acting as a gateway to another dimension made entirely of pasta and thus always refilling his plate so he can never finish. That's my guess anyways. Its a common lunchtime topic.

Its Cake Time! 4 people, 3 muddy mudpies, 1 fruity tiramisu and 1 unknown cake. We finished the lot.

Yong vs the Mudpie: Yong wins. He ate one and a half of these lovely Cappuccino and Oreo flavoured monsters.

Yong likes to eat and he always says he eats fast. I like stop motion animation so here's a very short video showcasing how to eat at Yong speed:

Photos from last last week!

2009-07-13T11:49:00.000+08:00

Last Friday night was very cloudy. The stars and planets (Saturn/Jupiter) were blocked. The moon only rose high enough after 10pm. Many of us and many visitors were disappointed that they couldn't see much from the sky. But we had a new introductory video made by ANDREW the AWESOME, which was really funny to watch and very informative! It's not on youtube, it's not on this webbie, you gotta visit us to watch it ;)

It appears that the weather these few days is rather cloudy. Saturday night was also cloudy, so was Sunday night.

I miss those nights when stars glitter merrily and the moon gleams in a corner beautifully and not too brightly. That makes a perfect night to gaze at stars and clusters and planets and their moons, to find constellations (Scorpius, Libra, Saggitarius and Southern Cross for now), and to explore the moon surface.

Just last last Friday it wasn't so bad. Towards 8 the sky threatened to rain. We set up the telescopes but had to quickly pack them back just in case. But the clouds flew past and the sky cleared up, to reveal Saturn, Scorpius, and other beautiful objects in the sky. We couldn't get enough.

Here are some pictures.

The Moon

On the moon, The Bay of Rainbows

Alpha Centauri (Yellow double star, and nearest star to the earth apart from the sun)

The "observatory cat" comes to visit every Friday night and pounces on green laser spots for fun. :)

More pictures coming right up! See ya this Friday! :)

Good Morning!

2009-07-09T09:09:00.000+08:00

Long time no blog, and I apologise >.< < >June school holidays brought us many many visitors and we are elated that there are so many people interested in Astronomy. Hope you guys come back soon! There are new and exciting things coming up in the Friday nights ahead, as you would be able to see on the "July Highlights" on your right that Andrew has updated. For those of you who want to see Mars, do check out "A Little Something For the Morning". For those of you who are excited about the upcoming Solar Eclipse, check out "Upcoming Events - Solar Eclipse". Thanks a lot Andrew!!!!!!!

While doing some research for our new space programmes, I came across this webbie by MSNBC. And I couldn't take my eyes off! The Month in Space showcases rare photographs related to Astronomy, and it archives 2 months back. So that's 60 eye candies to share with our beloved blog visitors. :D

Just a glimpse of what you'll see:

Go see it right now!
Meanwhile, what do you think of our blog? And which part of the Observatory did you enjoy the most? We certainly want to keep the Observatory a happy and warm place where the passion of Astronomy is shared. Do drop your comments or talk to us or share your knowledge with us via the tagboard on your right.

Thank you and have a good week ahead! See you on Friday :)

Star Map - July 2009 (Singapore)

2009-07-05T12:26:00.000+08:00

Hi everyone, the Star Maps are back!!!

Here's a map for the night sky in July:

Just a quick word about our Star Maps.
Each Star Map shows the position of the brightest stars and planets visible each month.

As the sky is always in motion ( due to the Earth's 24hr rotation) the position of an object in the Star Map is only an approximation, specifically between the times 8pm and 10pm in the evening.
After 10pm and on towards midnight, all the objects in the sky would have shifted more towards the West, with new objects appearing in the East.

A copy of these Star Maps will be available at the Science Centre Observatory (SCOB) every Friday night during our stargazing session between 7:45pm and 10pm.

Of course these Star Maps only specific to this region of the Earth, close to the Equator. Moving further North or South away from the Equator will give you a slightly different of the sky, however, some of the constellation will be the same.

As such, our Star Maps are not only valid for Singapore but can also be used in parts of Malaysia and Indonesia as well as parts of Central Africa, Northern Brazil, Peru, Ecuador and Columbia, in case you happen to live there or fancy going on holiday.

Happy Stargazing!!

The Sky From The Office - Fri 4.45PM 19 June

2009-06-19T16:46:00.000+08:00

Good news: Sky looks quite blue now! with some tiny fluffy clouds in the distance.

Hopefully as we Scobbers have dinner, the sky will turn blue-r and more cloudless, so that we can see the beautiful constellations and star clusters tonight! :)

OK, time for dinner! See you later, friends of the Observatory!

Why Isn't Pluto a Planet Anymore?

2009-06-18T11:37:00.000+08:00

Hi, long time no see! I stumbled across this video on Youtube and I thought I must share it. Very often we get visitors asking us, "What has happened to Pluto? Why isn't it a planet anymore?"

Well the answer is, nothing has happened to Pluto to make it not a planet, it is actually we humans who decided Pluto should not be classified as a planet, but a dwarf planet instead.

Why? Check out this very very informative and cute video to find out. :)

Viewing the International Space Station

2009-06-08T12:09:00.000+08:00

Last Friday (5th June) was a nice night. Although the Moon was almost full and brighten the sky considerably, it was remarkable clear, giving us a great view of constellations such as Leo, Crux, Centaurus and Ursa Major.

The best highlight of the night had to be the appearance of the International Space Station (ISS) as it raced across the sky in its Low Earth Orbit. It was only visible for 2 or 3 minutes but it was an impressive sight watching this bright white dot suddenly appear moving from NNW to SW before disppearing into the Earth's shadow. With a good pair of binoculars I was able to make out its irregular shape, different from stars or planet which look like round dots.

The ISS is orbitting the Earth at an altitude of about 35okm above the ground. It can complete 1 orbit of the Earth in about 90 mins and 15 orbits in one day. As such, if you're in the right time or place its a nice object to try and spot.

Dates and times for ISS sightings can be found on the NASA human spaceflight website:

http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings/

and also on a site called Heaven's Above:

http://www.heavens-above.com/?lat=1.29422&lng=103.85376&loc=Singapore&alt=0&tz=MALST

You need to select or find your viewing location (e.g. Singapore) before searching for the timings.

Here is a summary of the more visible sightings over next month (in Singapore):

Mon 8th June: 8:02pm to 8:04pm - moving from WSW to SSW direction - very low

(10-15 degree above horizon) - clear view of SW direction required.

Wed 10th June: 6:16am to 6:19am - moving from South to ESE direction - low in the sky

(10-20 degree above horizon) - clear view of SE direction required

Sat 13th June: 5:58am to 6:01am - from West to NNW (across Northern part of sky, staring 35 degrees above horizon)

Sun 5th July: 8:23pm to 8:27pm - moving from SW to NNE - passing almost directly overhead (85 degree from horizon)

Tues 7th July: 7:37pm to7:42pm - moving from SW to NNE - passing almost directly overhead (79 degree above horizon) - shortly after sunset.

Fri 10th July: 6:14am to 6:20am - moving from NNW to SE - fairly high in the sky (maximium of 51degrees above horizon)

The next time we can see the ISS at the observatory on our Friday night stargazing session is:

Friday 7th August: 7:40pm - for about 1 minute :( - traveling WSW to SSW, only 11 degrees above horizon.

Meaning just after sunset when we'll be setting up we might get another glimpse of ISS, hopefully.

The next "better" sighting on a Friday will be :

Fri 4th Sept - 7:36pm to 7:41pm - 5 minutes!!!! - SW to NNE

We look foward to it :)

The ISS taken from a NASA Space Shuttle (can't remember which shuttle tho) in orbit.

Photoelectric effect and how it relates to the colour of stars

2009-05-03T12:02:00.000+08:00

Photoelectric effect is the emission of electrons when light shines on a metallic surface. The emission of electron from this effect is called photoemission.

Materials such as metal will produce the photoelectric effect more readily. This is because the electrons in metals are free; they are only bonded lightly with its nucleus. That is the reasons why metals are good conductors (the electrons move when a voltage difference is placed across them) A collective movement of electrons is what we call “current”. Contrary to conventional thoughts, it is the movement of electrons or the negative charge that underlies the idea of what we consider “electricity” not +ve charge or protons.

When the photoelectric effect takes place, scientists can measure the electrons that are released by measuring the electrical voltage. They found out that it happens only with certain kinds of light. By doing further test, they discovered that what causes photoelectric effect is the frequency of light. The frequency of light also determines the colour of light that we see. Red colour is in the lower frequency and violet the highest frequency that our eyes can observe.

The higher the frequency, the more likely electrons will be emitted. The lower the frequency, the less likely photoelectric phenomenon will take place. It doesn’t matter how much power is used, you may use a thousand watts of low frequency light, but it would not cause the photoelectric effect to take place!

This has a really important implication, by discovering that energy is linked to light frequency. Increasing the intensity of light will produce more photons (or light) but it will not produce photoemission if the frequency is not high enough. The energy of the electrons emitted will also correspond to the energy or frequency of the light incident on the metallic surface: high frequency light will produce high energy electrons.

Conversely the energy of a system may be measure by the frequency of light it produces, a simple one is that produced by the Bunsen burner. The blue flame produced is actually hotter and energetic than the yellow flame. The same could be said for stars, the younger they are, the more energetic, as they age they will tend towards the lower frequency such as yellow and red.

Scobbers go to....

2009-05-02T10:53:00.000+08:00

VIVOCITY!

Side Walk Astronomy 1-2 May, 8-10PM

3rd Level Sky Park

Below: Yong the Evil Fungi aiming at the Moon... Which was the only sky object visible in such a bright sky at 7+PM.
Below: Now grinning cos he's found it in the scope!
Below: Andrew the Awesome asking why we want to take pictures of him! Below: Another telescope we have brought over, already aimed at the moon :)

Below: As the earth rotates, the moon keeps moving outside the crosshair, have to adjust the position of the telescope every now and then.

Below: Yong and Mr Albert Lim from TASOS!

Below: Valdric, our dedicated and knowledgeable volunteer! Talk to him! He has a very good sense of humour!

Below: The Ting, The Yong, The Awesome

Below: The Ting, The Yong, The Weird Gal with an evil glint in one eye. Oops, that's a very long name for myself...

We looked at the MOON, Saturn, Orion Nebula, Jewel Box, Sirius, among many other things! Side-walk Astronomy continues tonight, with us all waiting to explore the beautiful nightsky with the public! Besides us, there are many Astronomy enthusiasts and experts who have also set up high tech telescopes along the sky park. Prizes to be won, and souvenirs waiting for you to come and collect!

Do pop by and admire the beauty all around you, waiting to be discovered.

More pictures coming up from us Scobbers!

Pocketful of Stars

2009-04-29T11:14:00.000+08:00

This is one of the most romantic games around... Collect as many stars as you can, jump as high as you can, to the soothing music in the background.

Treat the stars as your little dreams, and see if you can reach them. And tonight, look up into the night sky, and know that the beautiful stars are there, twinkling away. Slow down, start looking around, and you will find that life is so beautiful sometimes...

Scobbers go to RP!

2009-04-29T10:08:00.000+08:00

Yesterday morning was great to sleep in... The morning was cold and rainy, I could sleep forever with the soothing and soft pitter patter of rain... And my bed was cosy and warm...

Nonetheless, I dragged myself to work to join Andrew, as we set off to REPUBLIC POLYTECHNIC for Portable Planetarium!!!

A trolley of really heavy equipment, which Andrew pushes.
Holding a little tupperware of torchlights is yours truly....... Look at the background... RP has a pretty swimming pool! OK that's a pond... no... a... lake?
the STARLAB portable planetarium. We coincidentally conduct portable planetarium sessions in Science Centre's Starlab too! The lab is called starlab. The planetarium is also called starlab...
After setting up and before you blow it up... it's as flat as a pancake...
And when you blow it up, it looks as yummy and as squishy as a steamed bun... Sorry I'm thinking too much about food...
Andrew popped out of the steamed bun... OK I shall say no more... :p

It was an Interest Group Fair I think... Where students go around booths and sign up for the ones that interest them. We were situated and hidden in a corner, so when students occasionally popped by and found us, they would walk/run away, afraid of the steamed bun...

So we had to think of ideas to attract these students and get them to join us in the stargazing... The portable planetarium is such an amazing experience that you would be sorry to miss! My attempt...

Andrew's attempt...

Andrew's second attempt.

This one worked! 3 girls walked past, saw Andrew the mummy, and giggled..... They eventually stepped inside the portable planetarium to see what we had to show :)

Talk to you again soon!

A cross, a centaur and a boat

2009-04-25T17:37:00.000+08:00

Lately, the weather has been very hot day and night, it can be very uncomfortable at times but its not all bad. For one thing my laundry drys alot quicker (however that can mean the ironing pile increases faster also), secondly, it seems the hot weather is creating some very clear skies which is great for stargazing particularly as we're coming to one my favourite times of the year.
During the months of May and June, you may want look outside one night and find somewhere that has a clear view of the southern sky.

As long as your not looking directly at a street light or at somebody's house you should be greeted by two (possibly three) bright constellations. I'm talking about the fairly well known Southern Cross and the constellation Centaurus.
Below is a representation of these constellations as they would appear when looking South:

The Southern Cross (officially known as Crux) has a distinctive diamond/kite shape formed by its four brightest stars. The bottommost star is called alpha crucis (or Acrux) it is the brightest of the four. Clockwise from Acrux are the other three stars are beta, gamma (the top star) and delta crucis, in that order.

Surrounding Crux like an arch are the stars of the centaur (Centaurus), named after the mythic creature possessing half the body of a horse and half the body of a man (obviously, the horse's body forms the lower part of the creature and the man's body the top part, not the other way around). The brightest stars in Centaurus are Alpha and Beta Centauri located just to the left(East) of Crux. Alpha centauri (Rigil Kentaurus) represents the front foot of the centaur and is the closest star system to the Sun. Through a telescope this star actually consists of two yellow stars. There is even a third star, a faint red star which is barely visible.

What make these constellations interesting to me is the wealth of other objects that lie around them. This includes some bright star cluster. My favourite would have to be the Jewel Box cluster (kappa crucis). Located close to beta crucis (Mimosa) it is a tight cluster of 50 or so shining stars one of which is distinctively red in colour.

Almost all the stars of Jewel Box can be seen through a telescope (depending on the sky conditions). The cluster can even be seen with binoculars. In fact this area of sky is great for exploring with binoculars, there are many other star clusters nearby.

In the diagram above, I've indicated the positions of the 7 other clusters. On a clear night, I find it most enjoyable to grab a pair of binos and scan this area. Most of these clusters will look like small fuzzy or misty patches as the binoculars will not be able to resolve the individual stars within each cluster, except maybe in Jewel Box. Here is a list of the other star clusters.

1. Omega Centauri globular cluster - a densely packed ball of thousands of stars

2. Open Cluster NGC3766

3. Open Cluster NGC 3532

4. Eta Carinae Nebula (NGC 3372) - a gas cloud and star cluster surrounding the explosive star eta carinae.

5. Open Cluster NGC 3293

6. Open Cluster IC 2581

7. Open Cluster IC 2602 - known as the Southern Pleiades

You may notice that many or these clusters lie next to the constellation Carina (representing one part of a sailing ship). The stars of Crux, Centaurus and Carina lie in front of a distant edge of our galaxy, The Milky Way. Although this dense band of stars is to faint to be seen in Singapore, we can still get a glimpse of some of its wonders like the Jewel Box star clusters.

A few weeks ago, I was at an astronomy event at East Coat Park (area D1). Below is a photo I took of the Southern Cross in the sky together with the star alpha and beta centauri, to the bottom left of the picture. (FYI, I took this picture with a regular Canon Ixus 8MP set to a 6 sec exposure/shutter speed)

I also couldn't resist a spot of light painting with a light stick. There was a new star in the sky that night - andrew centauri :) ....... sorry if that was a bit lame.

ATTENTION Observatory CLOSED on 1ST MAY

2009-04-17T12:32:00.000+08:00

This is just a heads-up to tell you that the Science Centre Observatory (SCOB) will be closed for one night on Friday May 1st (Labour Day).

Normally the observatory is open every Friday night but NOT on May 1st. Why? Are we taking a night off? Do we wanna spend labour day relaxing in front of a nice BBQ? NOOOOO! Of course not.....well, now i think about it a BBQ would be nice.......(mmm Otah!).......but NO, the time for BBQ's will have to wait....(but not too long I hope)

On Friday May 1st and Saturday May 2nd, SCOBBERS ARE GOING TO VIVO! And we're taking our telescopes too.
We are taking part in the Sidewalk Astronomy Carnival, part of Singapore's effort for the International Year of Astronomy (2009).
Science Centre will there, TASOS will be there along with The History Channel and Starhub.

So, DO NOT COME TO OBSERVATORY ON MAY1ST....................COME TO VIVOCITY INSTEAD:

6pm til late- May 1st & 2nd
Level 3 - Skypark

Program

6:00pm – 6:30 Astronomy projects for kids/families
6:30 – 7:00 Stage games by emcee + FAQs
7:00 – 7:45 History Channel Screening of The Universe (The Moon)
7:50 Welcome Mdm Ellen Lee, MP for Sembawang GRC & Adviser to Woodlands GRC
8:00 Telescope viewing starts
8:00 – 9:00 “The Night Sky and our Solar System” Talk by Mr Kalaimani s/o Retnasamy (Founder member and Hon Secretary, TASOS)
9:00 – 9:15 Stage games by emcee + FAQs
9:15 – 10:00pmHistory Channel Screening of The Universe (Saturn – Lord of the Rings)

Last Friday...

2009-04-15T14:09:00.000+08:00

...we had a really fun session! While visitors at the main telescope looked at Saturn and the Full Moon, Andrew conducted a really nice talk thrice so that most visitors gets to join in!

Some photos of friends and visitors that I took standing at the stairs... If you find your photo here and you do not like it, let me know and I'll remove it immediately ok?

The evening before the session was a beautiful one... (Taken at the junction in front of Science Centre.)

Using a pair of binoculars to look at the moon...

Young budding astronomer and her daddy... :)

A family looking at the huge orange moon that had just risen...

Looking at the stars low on the horizon are...

...2 sisters here with their family.

HOPE TO SEE U AGAIN AT SCOB! :)

Hello!

2009-04-05T10:54:00.000+08:00

Just this Friday we looked at Saturn, then the moon!

The moon was at a beautiful first quarter. Some of the visitors took pictures (when there were less people in the dome), and Mr Albert Ho pointed out a very interesting part of the moon to me.

Do you see an almost straight line in the picture above? That is the Rupus Recta, also called the "Straight Wall".

During the first quarter of the moon, the Straight Wall casts a shadow on the moon's surface, which is what we see in the photo now. However in the last quarter, the Straight Wall will appear as a bright line!

It blows me away to find out this interesting fact. More interesting facts are bound to be discovered next Friday (Good Friday), when it is Full Moon.

Hope to see you all there, we love the MOOOOOOOOOOONNNNN!!

And let's all wish Huiting best of health as she is still recovering from the operation. Get well soon Huiting! We miss your sweet smile! :)

Dark Adaptation of Our Eyes

2009-04-01T17:32:00.000+08:00

To view objects in the sky which are sometimes dim, our eyes need to first adapt to darkness.

Dark adaptation takes time. The eye’s pupil expands to its maximum diameter in seconds after the lights go out. The main cause of dark adaptation, however, is chemical and not related to the size of the pupil. Over the first 5 to 10 minutes in the dark, cone cells in our eyes reach their maximum level of dark adaptation. But over the next 20-40 minutes our eyes can gain 2 or more magnitudes of sensitivity. - MIT

This often makes a difference!

Red flashlight, however, helps protect your night vision. The rod cells in our eyes are not sensitive to red light. Rod cells are those that helped our eyes gain 2 more magnitudes of sensitivity after dark adaptation as mentioned above. The lamps in SCOB are covered with a red film, and red pocket flashlights can be purchased from Astronomy shops to read sky maps with during star gazing.

So the next time you are gazing at objects in the sky - stars, planets, nebulae... Do not blind yourself with bright flashlights from cameras. They often leave white spots in front of your eyes which hinder your own vision! :)

Space Rocks!

2009-03-31T11:48:00.000+08:00

Space rocks comes in many shapes, sizes and can be constitute of many various substances! Scientists believed that Space rocks may be the remains of a planet that was destroyed billions of years ago or that it could be the debris left over from the formation of the solar system. No one really knows...Perhaps one day one day we will have confirmation on which one is more correct. The reason why scientists believed that space rocks may once be part of a planet is that some of them can be entirely made up of Iron and other heavy metals which are usually found in the core of planets!

Most of the space rocks are found in orbit around the sun. That orbital path is called the Asteroid Belt the other name for space rocks floating out in space is also Asteroids, smaller space rocks are called Meteoroids.

Any space rocks that has a diameter smaller than 1.6km is called a Meteoroid.

The picture above is drawn with artistic license, so please take it up with the proper authorities.

Sometimes the orbital path of a space rock would fall outside the Asteroid belt and come closer to earth than usual. Sometimes the gravitational pull from Earth may pull it even closer, and sometimes the gravitational pull of it may even cause the poor space rock to fall onto the surface of Earth at such great speed that the rock may create a streak of fire forming a long tail. We call this phenomenon "shooting stars" or meteors, we never call them asters. Occasioanlly if the space rock is large enough, or is made of denser substances like Iron, they may survive the journey all the way from space and smack right into Earth forming a crater. The left over space rock that survived is called meteorite.

This is the artist's childlike impression of a particularly large shooting star.

Earth Hour 2009

2009-03-28T20:23:00.000+08:00

Dear all! This is my 1st post on this blog! And although it's not going to be about astronomy, it's about something that affects everyone! (Drumroll....)
It's Earth Hour 2009! Today, 28th March 8.30pm -9.30pm!

Vote for Earth against global warming. And let your light switch be your vote.
Alright, it's 8.28pm now and I'm going to switch off my lights as soon as I finish this post!
Have you voted yet?

What's up this week!

2009-03-27T15:21:00.000+08:00

Its Friday again and another week has gone by. I didn't quite get round to posting more blogs and the installation of the air-con seems to have stalled, which is quite annoying. I guess our dear fans will be able to enjoy a few more weeks of service before the A/C is operational. Although we are looking forward to using the air-con with great anticipation, there is something to be said for the noble fan. For one, it uses alot less energy and in these times of global warming that's quite a plus. Ok so it doesn't cool you down as well as the high energy consuming air-con but its a better friend to the environment. Having said that, I'd wish they'd hurry up and install that energy hungry beast in the observatory so we can have slightly cooler Friday nights, heehee :-). Its not as eco friendly as a fan but it sure is cooler and its only for two hours a week, not that bad right? Anyway, at home the fan is still my friend. I barely use air-con anymore and only use one fan when sleeping. As a result my utilities bill has come right down, which makes me very happy :0D. So that's my message of the week, a good way to look after our Earth is to find the right moviation...i.e. saving money. Reduce your electricity bill, get some spare cash and help the environment whether it was your intention to or not.

Back to our main business, Astronomy. I was hoping to start a regular series of posts regarding what we'll be expecting to look at each week including a starmap for the month so I'll start with tonight.

Just like last week our main highlight will be the planet Saturn. If there is time and it is clear enough we may look for some interesting star clusters also. For example, the Beehive cluster, M44 in Cancer. Slightly more ambitious will be the Eta Carinae nebula in Carina, difficult because it lies low in the south where there tends to be alot of light pollution. Of course we should be able to see the Orion Nebula, M42 again as Orion descend lower toward the Western horizon.

Here's a raw image that I took of Saturn at the end of last week's observatory session:

You might notice that it is on its side, that is because we are in Singapore, near the equator and therefore standing on the side of the Earth giving us a sideways view of objects in the sky. Saturn will only appear right side up when its directly overhead.

Although it is the end of the month, below is a Skymap for March for anyone located around Singapore. It shows the approximate position of the bright stars and constellations visible from our brightly lit island:

That's all for now. Look out for more updates for April next week.

Air-Con Has Arrived!!

2009-03-19T18:09:00.000+08:00

I’m back! I couldn’t resist writing another one, this time without the pointless waffling and have more pictures.....Mmmmm... I like waffles :o)

I just received word that our new air-con unit for the main observatory is here. Hurray!!! After 20 years the observatory will finally have air-con, Friday night stargazing will never again be such a sweaty affair. Actually, it remains to be seen how effective the cooling effect will be, especially as it has to cope with the huge opening in the roof that enables us to see the sky. There should at least a cooling breeze around the telescope, providing a more comfortable environment for all......hopefully.

Hearing the news, I was excited, naturally, so I ran down with my camera to record the prestigious moment of installation.

Here, the air-con unit is being carried up to the observatory

There it sits just waiting to come out of its box.

Although we will still have fans on around the perimeter of the observatory, it dawned on me that the fans on the upper level (around the telescope) will be seldom used once the air-con is up and running.
Dear fans, you have performed your duty with honour and will always have a special place in the observatory (probably a dusty corner in the storeroom). We bid you a fond farewell and thank you.

After the farewell ceremony, I was surprised to hear that the air-con will only be installed tomorrow....bother!!
Therefore, I took a picture of where the air-con will be located, with myself as a stand-in (literally) for the air-con unit.

To be continued......

We Are GO!!!

2009-03-19T16:51:00.000+08:00

It is done, we have our blog! Hurray! Actually, we’ve been planning to start this blog for several months now but things have been busy at Science Centre lately for me and my fellow “Scobbers”. I must especially thank SK (aka Ruijie) who came up with the original idea and got it going.

This is the first time I’m writing a blog....can you tell? How am I doing so far?
Over the last 24 hours I’ve found myself thinking alot about the blog, thoughts like: What shall we write? Will it be good? Who are we writing to? Ourselves?? Each other? ??Our visitors????? How about everyone? Should I record the time spent blogging in my work record form? How long have I been writing now? Why so many questions? What am I talking about? How do I stop? What’s for dinner?

Ok I better stop here before I go totally off track, according to some of the scobbers, I have a tendency to be quite longwinded in my explanations. Can you tell? How am I doing now? Maybe it has something to do with being English? My Singaporean family and friends often tell me that when in the UK and asking for directions, people gave the longest possible answers, for example “Which way to the train station?” Answer: “What you have to do is go down the High Street across the mini-roundabout, past the zebra-crossing next to the newsagents and then onto the post office, turn right onto Penny Lane, cross-over the road and a little further down is the station.” Of course what you just want to know is “ go straight to the post office and turn right”. Now, I’ve never experienced this personally, its just what people tell me. I’m sure not all English people are like that, even if they are, there’s nothing wrong with a little friendly conversation.

Oh dear, I got carried away again. Back to the main purpose of this blog, Astronomy! In fact, I believe that it was no mere coincidence that heavy work schedules and procrastination caused the launch of this blog to be delayed until March. Originally, we planned it for January to coinside with the start of the International Year of Astronomy. However, starting the blog in March is perfect timing as it is the 20-year anniversay of the main telescope at the Science Centre observatory.
Although the International Year of Astronomy (2009) is significant as the 400-year anniversary of Galileo‘s first demonstration of an astronomical telescope (in 1609), we can also celebrate the birthday of Science Centre’s first telescope which, up until recently was the largest in Singapore.

Happy Birthday “Big 16inch (40cm) Cassegrain Relfector”!!!!
Hmm.......we may need to give it a better name. Suggestions are welcome;-)

My first blog post is done.......How’d I do?

2 songs about the Moon that we love

2009-03-18T17:14:00.001+08:00

A really sweet song by Ernie from Sesame Street about the MOON...

...and a super funny one from Sponge Monkeys.

Some Favourite Photos :)

2009-03-17T18:13:00.000+08:00

Door to the dome containing the main telescope:

View of the evening sky on a certain Friday night, as well as the smaller dome:

A typical night with a queue to the main telescope and visitors having fun all around the area. Picture is rather grainy, but do you see the full moon?

SCOB - Science Centre OBservatory

OBSERVATORY CLOSED 11TH NOVEMBER

Total Lunar Eclipse on 15th/16th June

SPAstro

Rainy Days and Shooting Stars

Festival of Stars - Shooting Stars, Jupiter and Movies!

Festival of Stars - Star Maps and Jupiter's Moons

I love the mooooon!

The Jewel Box

Google Sky Map for Android Phones

SCOB Color Wall

Sky at Science Centre now:

Astronaut Photography of Earth

Februrary's Night Sky

Friday 15th Jan - Partial Solar Eclipse

Festive cheer at SCOB!

January Star Map

Viewing the sun from Science Centre Observatory

An Amazing Visual Treat

Before we close for the year,

December Star Map

Some recent Fisheye Lomo B&W Pics of the Science Centre OBservatory - Day time

This Morning's Sky

New Books at the Observatory!

Scobbers go to... Parkway Parade!

@ Japanese Garden

Leonids Meteor shower 17th & 18th Nov

Scobbers go to... Japanese Gardens and Parkway Parade!

Cloudy Fridays...

Water on the Moon - CONFIRMED!

SCOB is on Twitter! Join us!

Star Maps - October 2009

TONIGHT: Mid Autumn Nite. Free Lanterns and Mooncakes, Special discounts for Science Centre, IMAX Movie and Snow City.

Tonight's forcast - CLOUD!!!!!!!

PLANETARIUM SESSIONS 4TH & 11TH SEPT!!!!!

September Star Map

Scobbers and Friends @ Brewerkz

Memoirs of an amateur astronomer

Today's Google logo shows this:

tonight's sky - 14th Aug

Today's Google logo shows this:

August Star Map

How does Andrew the Awesome take pictures of the sky? and other photos.

Tonight's weather

Coming Soon in August

A guide to July's sky

The weather tonight (24th July)

Eclipse Event 22 July 2009

The Sky From The Office - Fri 4.52PM 17 July

Scobbers' Pets

Scobbers go to Coffee Club

Photos from last last week!

Good Morning!

Star Map - July 2009 (Singapore)

The Sky From The Office - Fri 4.45PM 19 June

Why Isn't Pluto a Planet Anymore?

Viewing the International Space Station

Photoelectric effect and how it relates to the colour of stars

Scobbers go to....

Pocketful of Stars

Scobbers go to RP!

A cross, a centaur and a boat

**ATTENTION** Observatory CLOSED on 1ST MAY

Last Friday...

Hello!

Dark Adaptation of Our Eyes

Space Rocks!

Earth Hour 2009

What's up this week!

Air-Con Has Arrived!!

We Are GO!!!

2 songs about the Moon that we love

Some Favourite Photos :)

ATTENTION Observatory CLOSED on 1ST MAY