Henry Rifle Forums

We visited the Museum Of Arts And Science in Daytona Beach yesterday.

We made it to Dunn, NC last night and will continue on to GA for two days before making the final journey home. I hate to leave the warm south and return to the forecasted -17F.

Hey Gene, is the swan constellation called Cignus? Great visit.

Cofisher wrote: ↑

Sat Dec 17, 2022 2:48 pm

Hey Gene, is the swan constellation called Cignus? Great visit.

Yes it is. How did you know that?

Good for you, yes, that's Cygnus the Swan. That star at the end of the tail is Deneb, the most distant bright star in the sky. It is estimated to have the power output 80,000 times that of our Sun. It's only because it is so distant that keeps it from appearing brighter to us. Massive, hot stars like Deneb are shorter lived and more unstable than stars like our Sun, so it's a good thing Deneb is not close.

My dad was an Air Force pilot. He tried to teach me, some of it stuck. Thanks Joanie. Does that make Sirius a biggun also? I love the night sky.

We watched a half hour show on the planets and stars. What was nice is the program was synced to what we would see in the night sky that night in Daytona Beach. What I remember about Cygnus was that we were looking at it 6,000+ years ago.

Watched an interesting show on PBS the other day. Said that eventually our local group would combine into one galaxy and all the other galaxies will be so distant that they will not be visible even with the most powerful telescope.

Also, at least in our galaxy less new stars are being formed than are dying so eventually there will be no active stars. This will be a long time from now as red dwarfs have incredibly long life spans (some in the trillions of years).

Staying at Norma’s nieces place in Suffolk, VA. They live in the country in a huge four story home. Their foyer is larger than my house. The ceilings are 14’ and it’s southern Victorian. At one time the family owned four sections but now only have about 20 acres.

We will be here one more night before continuing on our last leg home. When we get to Ogema on Wednesday the low will be -14F. At least there is two feet of snow so I can try out my new snows shoes.

Gene, Sirius is bright because it is intrinsically bright (hot) AND because it is so close. It's basically one of our neighbors.