Occultation of BY Cancri (SAO 98054) by Saturn and its ring system25th January 2006 (18h 05 UT - 20h 50m UT)This event is going to take place during the evening of Wednesday, 25th January, a few days before Saturn's 2006 opposition, and should be quite spectacular telescopically, particularly as SAO 98054, at m(v) 7.9 is a little brighter than Titan. The occultation presents an interesting challenge for both amateurs who use CCD's for imaging, and also for those who sketch what they see. It is of course reasonably rare for a star of this magnitude to be occulted by the Saturnian System, and I do hope that you will want to take up the challenge. The occultation had been noted last summer by Dr Tolis Christou of the Armagh Observatory in Northern Ireland, but very little information has been distributed as yet. My own predicted data relating to the event for central UK (using Guide 8 software) is as follows:
Occultation by Ring A: 18h 50m (all times = UT). I am encouraging all members of the SPA to attempt observing this interesting occultation, and hopefully some of you may try imaging it, especially during the Cassini "window" around 19h 01m - 19h 06m.
The following information is from David Herald, Canberra, Australia:
The occultation by Saturn will be visible from Europe, Africa and Asia - although South Africa will get a miss. There are no occultations by the rings after the planetary occultation, but an extensive passage through the rings before the occultation. That passage will occur at low altitude in Europe, but will also be visible in Japan and Australia. One of the challenges for this event will be in detecting the star. At Mv=7.9, Mp=8.1, the star is only marginally brighter than Titan (mag 8.4 on that date). Note that the surface brightness of Titan is about the same as the planet and rings A and B, Note that passage through Ring C might be more readily visible, but the star does not pass through Ring C for any location on the Earth. The greater challenge will be to get a decent recording of the event - and appropriate filtering might be highly desirable.
Note about BY Cancri ( SAO 98054) |
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Maintained by Jeff Stevens. Last modified 23rd December 2005.