A few days ago, the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore released a new image from the James Webb Space Telescope (see here). It shows spiral-shaped rings around the massive binary star Wolf-Rayet 140...
20. October 2022
News
Dangers are everywhere
Unlike a private observatory, we operate a public school observatory. And it has to be operated safely for all astronomers and visitors. With the support of a state-approved safety officer who is well-disposed towards...
8. October 2022
Preparation of an observation night in time lapse
In our school lab, it is possible to make nocturnal observations of the sky without extensive effort. The telescopes are already completely installed on their mountings under their weather protection cubes and are...
26. September 2022
The moon in the smartphone
At our observatory, clever young astronomers appear again and again, who have techniques that the old hands do not have on their screen. One of these colleagues has now shown us what he can do with his smartphone...
24. September 2022
Digital positioning
In old times, telescopes were positioned with so-called circular scales, which mapped the celestial coordinate system. The positioning accuracy was increased like a caliper with an angular vernier to then track the...
17. September 2022
The darkness returns
The announced electricity price increases seem to be having a positive effect on our evening skies at the moment. Many outdoor lights simply stay off. The darkness of the evening sky, which was already thought to be...
5. September 2022
Teachers practice in the school lab
In August, we held a beginners’ course for interested teachers in our school lab. The first goal was the basic operation of the instruments. This included telescope control, taking color images with a digital...
2. September 2022
Our first astrophotos in the SchoolLab
In the middle of July we took our first own astrophotographs in the observatory. Before that, we had received an introduction to the controls of the telescope. After taking several pictures of the sun we were already a...
27. August 2022
The first photo through the large telescope
To test the optical performance of our main instrument, we have now used a large CCD camera in the telescope focus for the first time. This camera is adapted to the telescope focal length, so that the image sampling is...
8. August 2022
Report of a club member
At the beginning of August, the weather often shows its best side. The nights are already noticeably longer. So it is time again to sacrifice some hours of sleep for the dear hobby and to change it for an experience of...
7. August 2022
Das Tor ins Weltall öffnet sich bald
Trusted journalist Arndt Gaudich caught up on our work progress, reports on the upcoming commissioning of our large telescope, and on our new colleagues.
Article: Das Tor zum Weltall öffnet sich bald
25. July 2022
Wolfhard Schlosser 1940 – 2022
We have lost a great teacher and friend of the school observatory. Prof. Dr. Wolfhard Schlosser was a founding member and honorary president of our association. He passed away on July 14 after a long illness. Wolfhard...
18. July 2022
