astrophoto

Its light takes 23 million years to reach us, the giant Whirlpool Galaxy gobbles a smaller gallaxy and ignites hot blue stars in its 1000 billion suns.

M51 Gary Verstick/SLOOH Image

These images were captured using the SLOOH robotic telescope located on the 'dark-skyed' Canary Islands. Its one of 60 observatories on Mt.Teide. As a member I can access and control the 14'' scope from my home laptop. For more info on becoming a member of SLOOH click on their site below. -ZEN

The Centaurus Galaxy is a giant elliptical galaxy transversed by a wide dust band - remnant of a spiral galaxy swallowed up in the distant past. Its 12 million light years distant.

The beautiful Sombrero galaxy is 50,000,000 light years away in the Virgo galaxy cluster. It is surrounded by a thousand globular clusters.

At the centre of the Virgo galaxy cluster, lies the giant ellipitical galaxy M87 - one of the most massive in the known universe with 10,000 billion stars hiding a supermassive black hole.

An exploding star observed by the Chinese in 1054, CRAB NEBULA is a remnant of a supergiant star that 'exploded' in supernova leaving a spectacular nebula of debris and a neutron star about 10 miles across spinning 30 times a second and weighing as much as 3 suns. A teaspoon full of its matter would weigh a million tons.

Spiral galaxy NGC 4565 shows us what our Milky Way galaxy would look like when viewed edge-on from a great distance.

As an armchair cosmologist and amateur astronomer, I've been amazed at the information and exciting images being rapidly discovered by the astronomical community and its cornucopia of scientific gear. We've learned so much about the universe on a cosmic level in a short time. On a personal level, one of my great joys was the discovery of SLOOH. It's not unusual for me to turn on my computer at 2 oclock on a sunny afternoon in Vancouver, and after punching in a few co-ordinates on a solo mission, start a 14" robotic telescope slewing in its dome on Mt. Tiede in the dark-skied Canary Islands off the coast of Africa. In minutes I'm downloading 'live' CD images of The Whirlpool Galaxy, 23 million lightyears away. Astronomy is suddenly accessible to a much broader community. I think it was Michael Paolucci who speculated that it is just a matter of time before a 9 yr girl discovers a supernova on her home computer. Check out SLOOH for their free trial offer. Wishing you dark skies - ZEN

This one sunspot is responsible for making September 2005 one the most active months on the Sun in 25 years! It produced several massive solar flares and Coronal Mass Ejections that hit the earth causing radio interference, took out satellites and produced spectacular auroral displays in regions where they are seldom seen.

Gary Verstick photogaphed Spot 798 on Sept. 13/2005 using a 7.2mp camera and a 70mm Meade Goto scope with filter.

M42 in Orions sword is illuminated by four supergiant stars.

ANDROMEDA GALAXY (M31)

Our closest spiral galaxy neighbour ANDROMEDA is a floating island universe of a 1,000 billion suns appearing much like our Milky Way galaxy would look except that Andromeda is about half again larger. When we look up on a clear dark night, we can see Andromeda with our naked eyes as a dim fuzzy spot. Its interesting to think that even though the photons of light have been travelling along at a speedy clip of 1 billion kilometres an hour, it still takes 2.5 million years for the light to reach our eyes. And conversely, when you look at Andromeda, you are looking two and a half million years into the past!

Visit Jack Newton's site below to see some incredible views of our universe by a gifted astronomer!

Any reader of Sky & Telescope, Astronomy or National Geographic will be familiar with Jack Newton's work. Jack is an internationally recognized astronomer, author, photographer who with wife Alice, spend half the year in their Arizona Sky Village (a community of astro-enthusiasts and robotic telescopes), and half the year at their incredible mountaintop observatory home near Osoyoos, B.C. Canada. It was a great joy to find out their Osoyoos home is a B&B offering Alice's tasty breakfasts and Jack's nightly tours of the universe. On rare nights when clouds hide the view, they can entertain guests with views thru their robotically-controlled Arizona scope! Visit Jack and Alice's website at: www.jacknewton.com

OSOYOOS OBSERVATORY B&B

When Zen shot these sunspots from his porch in Vancouver, they were the largest in decades.

The Oct 2003 sunspots were the largest in many decades, this spot is the size of 10 earths put out a huge solar flare that hit the earth with a 2,000,000 mph blast of energized atomic particles, disrupting communications and power on earth and caused amazing auroral displays. I shot this with a small 'Goto' Meade scope and solar filter.

Verstick/ETX-70mm/Nikon

SUNSPOT & ECLIPSE

verstick/ETX-70mm/Nikon