Messier Marathon 2011

As it is always delightful to add to the Messier Marathon the observation of as many of the planets as possible, with Uranus impossible this year (like upcoming years), together with Jupiter, and on the March date Mercury and Neptune, on April date Mars. So on either date, you may probably not see more than 4 or 5 planets (counting Pluto in).

Some comets brighter than about mag 14.0 will be visible; we will list them below from various sources (e.g., IAU's Observable Comets page, Skyhound's Comet Chasing page, Gary Kronk's list of current comets and the Fachgruppe Kometen list):

Comet                       RA  (2000.0)  Dec  mag    RA  (2000.0)  Dec  mag
                                March  5, 2011            March 30, 2011

C/2010 B1 Cardinal          04:32:46 -16:34.6  14.5   04:33:18 -17:37.9  14.8
123P/West-Hartley           05:06:01 +38:06.3  14.7   05:44:15 +37:41.3  14.6
29P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 1  10:59:44 -00:13.9  15.6   10:49:19 +00:40.7  15.6  Outbursts! c. 11m
C/2010 X1 Elenin            11:44:41 +00:15.0  14.8   11:14:21 +03:19.6  14.1
P/2010 V1 Ikeya-Murakami    16:59:02 -29:55.0  12.4   17:26:04 -32:55.2  12.5
C/2010 G2 Hill              17:54:21 +45:56.9  14.8   18:26:39 +60:54.9  14.3
P/2010 H2 Vales             18:24:53 -26:59.2  14.2   18:47:47 -28:01.2  14.0  
P/2006 U1 LINEAR            18:41:06 -28:06.7  14.9   22:09:18 -10:15.6  13.2  = P/2011 A4 LINEAR
9P/Tempel                   20:28:02 -23:08.9  12.3   21:38:32 -20:13.1  12.9
C/2006 S3 LONEOS            20:28:48 -06:21.9  13.9   20:30:41 -05:38.9  13.7
C/2009 P1 Garradd           22:29:15 -18:37.4  13.3   22:43:11 -14:53.8  12.9  close to sun - elong 15/32 deg

C/2009 F4 McNaught          16:37:54 -70:44.2  14.5   16:32:02 -76:16.4  14.4

Note that occasionally comets become bright shortly (like Hyakutake in 1996, Ikeya-Zhang and Utsunomiya in 2002), so check back for possible updates shortly before Marathon date. Also occasionally, a supernova of brightness available to amateur telesopes may have flashed up be spottable in time (like SN 1998S in NGC 3877, SN 2002ap in M74, SN 2006X in M100 in their years of appearance).

This year, of the "first" four minor planets, (1) Ceres will be almost impossible to observe, and also (2) Pallas and (4) Vesta difficult - all appearing in the morning sky; only (3) Juno will be easily observable. For those who want to try these objects, data for the two weekends in question are as follows:

Planet       RA  (2000.0)  Dec  mag   RA  (2000.0)  Dec  mag
                 March 4, 2011           April 3, 2011


(1) Ceres    21:51:19 -20:10.6  9.2   22:36:21 -16:55.4  9.3
(2) Pallas   19:37:40 +07:06.5 10.5   20:07:33 +10:35.8 10.4
(3) Juno     11:35:37 +02:31.9  9.1   11:13:17 +07:05.4  9.5
(4) Vesta    19:11:22 -20:21.8  7.8   20:07:49 -18:57.6  7.6 

Also, meteors from various showers may occur, and depending on your location, you may be able to observe the International Space Station, ISS.

• The 2011 All Arizona Messier Marathon is scheduled for April 2/3, 2011. This event is sponsored again by the Saguaro Astronomy Club (SAC) (for the 19th time). This year, it was essential to select a new, completely different site, the Hovatter Airstrip, an abandoned airport. - A.J. Crayon & Rick Tejera
  Also see SAC's 2011 All Messier Marathon announce.
• Messier Marathon founder Tom Hoffelder will give a presentation and conduct a Messier Marathon at the Custer Institute on Long Island. The site will be at this island's western end. The event is scheduled for April 2nd with a cloud date of the 9th. For Tom, this will complete 34 years of Messier Marathoning!
• Prof. Sorin Hotea (coordinator of AstroInfo website and Astromagazin shop) will organize the Messier Marathon 2011 in Romania. Astronomers are called to run into the marathon between March 1st and April 10th. Every participant at MM 2011 will receive a certificate to acknowledge their results. See the Romanian MM 2011 page.
• the Lipan Astronomical and Space Society (LASS) near Lipan, TX USA will be holding a Messier Marathon event on the evening of 05 March 2011. Coordinates: N32.75, W97.65. - Edward Kotapish
• The North Central Kansas Astronomical Society (NCKAS) have scheduled their marathon for March 4, 2011 or if cloudy March 5, 2011. Their yearly event is to image all 110 objects in one night. Of course this year it will be impossible to image them all due to the lunar cylcle, but they have a very exciting event scheduled nonetheless. They have imagers participating from Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico and Florida this year. It's a virtual cooperative effort and images will be posted as they go, at their Messier Marathon website. The public can follow along and post comments and questions all night long. - Todd K. Tuttle
• The Kutch Amateur Astronomers Club are planning to organize a messier Marathon 2011 event on 5th March 2011, in the 6th year since 2006. The place is Dhosa, NW of Bhuj 21 Km, coordinates: Lat. 23.3257056N Long. 69.6254897E. Equipment includes an 8-inch reflector, 6-inch refractor, and 25x100 binoculars. Prosppective participants include Narendra Gor, Rahul Zota, Nishant Gor, Kartik Pomal, Jigar, Chandani, Rina, Amit, and Gunjan Doshi. - Narendra Gor
• The Astronomical Society of Las Cruces will hold its 8th Annual Messier Marathon on Saturday, March 26th at their Upham, NM dark-sky site. They are scheduling during 3rd quarter moon this year to potentially get all 110 objects. The moon will rise late, and looks to not interfere too much with the objects in Sagittarius. Backup/rain/cloud date is Saturday 2 April 2011. - Steve Barkes
• The North Central Kansas Astronomical Society (NCKAS) plan a second try, "Messier Marathon Part Deux," for their yearly event on April 2/3, 2011. This is, once more, to image all 110 objects in one night (of course, as outlined above, this year it will be impossible to image them all). Their imagers are ready to participate once more from Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico and Florida. Again, it's a virtual cooperative effort and images will be posted as they go, at their Messier Marathon website. The public can follow along and post comments and questions all night long. - Todd K. Tuttle

If you have undertaken, or participated in, a Messier Marathon, 2011 or earlier, if not already done so, please send me your or your group's results, or the link to your results page, for inclusion in our Messier Marathon Results page!

Hartmut Frommert
Christine Kronberg
[contact]

Last Modification: March 18, 2011