CLUB NEWS

The fourth Thursday of every month (except December, June and July) is our Monthly Club Meeting

Everyone is welcome to visit. We meet at 7:00 pm, Gentle Shepherd Church, 3 Ottawa Avenue.                                               Our President, Hans Uhl runs a lively and informative meeting. Usually, one of the club members gives a short presentation about a topic they have researched recently.

Photos of the Total Solar Eclipse, Australia, evening of  Dec. 4, 2002.

Our club member, Dr. Tim deBortoli, and two of his collegues, Dr. John Long and Dr. Frank Chi, travelled to Australia to visit relatives and friends and see the eclipse of the sun.

They landed in Melbourne after a 23 hour flight from Toronto via LosAngeles, rented a Volkswagon camper van and drove past Adelaide and on towards Ceduna.

The blue line marks the path of totality. To avoid coastal clouds they treked about 250 kilometres inland over rough gravel roads to reach the "X" labelled with the handwritten "Eclipse".

Tim's equipment: William's Optics Megrez telescope,  80mm, f6 with 24 mm eyepiece and a Thousand Oaks solar filter. The camera was a Coolpix 995 using afocal technique.

At the very last moment before totality, we see Bailey's Beads. These appear when the last rays of sunshine stream through valleys between mountains on the moon. A remarkable photograph.

Here we are at total eclipse (with the solar filter removed). Note several solar flares clearly visible in the corona. Magnificent.

And last, but not least, the glorious "Diamond Ring" effect, as the sun emerges from behind the moon. Many, many thanks to Tim for providing us with these stellar photographs.