THE BIRMINGHAM ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY OF ALABAMA

10/02/2026

Fall is in the air! Clear skies everyone!

09/19/2026

Come join us tonight (weather permitting) at Oak Mountain State Park for International Observe the Moon Night. Birmingham Astronomical Society members will be on hand with a variety of telescopes to view the Moon as well as other deep sky objects of interest in the Alabama September sky.

09/16/2026

First light for Roman!

NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope team has successfully activated the Wide Field Instrument, a 300-megapixel infrared camera that will allow scientists to explore wide swaths of the cosmos very quickly without sacrificing exquisite detail.

This test image captures the very first photons of starlight to reach the instrument. It was taken as an initial performance assessment with the detector array still stowed as it was for launch, far from best focus: https://go.nasa.gov/4rg4qEc

09/09/2026

If this applies to you, feel free to contact us. We are here to help with everything: from getting you back up to speed; helping you determine the value of your equipment and showing you how to sell it; finding a new home for your equipment via our donation process. Let us know if we can help!

Do you have a Reflector, or a Refractor, or a Schmidt-Cassegrain
that has sat idle for way too long?
Perhaps you have one squirreled away somewhere just collecting dust?

Ask yourself this: When was the last time you had it under the stars?
One month ago? One year ago? 10 years ago?

Remember: the best telescope is the one that is used!

If you are unsure how to use it, but would like to learn, why not contact your local amateur astronomy club for expert guidance?

Another option is to sell it. After all, if it is only taking up needed space in your home, it might as well be put into good use by someone else!

Or better yet, how about giving it to an interested, deserving person? It just might ignite a life-long passion for astronomy! You will have positively affected someone's life, someone who lives in your community.

Consider if all its parts are in working order:
Focuser turns properly?
Mount swivels smoothly?
Does it have eyepieces?
Does it have a finder scope?

Even though you'd like it to look spiffy for a new owner,
please don't be tempted to clean the optics – eyepieces, mirrors, and lenses – unless you know what you are doing.

09/08/2026

A little backstory in honor of Astronomy equipment and technology has changed a lot in 60 years. Make sure that you check out our members' images on our website!

09/08/2026

Something that you may not know about the Nimoys:

09/08/2026

Wow! BTW, the interest in imaging Saturn's South polar region was initiated by an amateur astronomer!

Hubble: Decagon Around Saturn's South Pole (APOD: 2026 Sep 08)
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, STScI, HST; A. Sánchez-Lavega (UPV), A. Simon (NASA-GSFC), M. Wong (UC Berkeley); Processing: A. Pagan (STScI)
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260908.html

Explanation: Why are Saturn’s poles geometric? Saturn’s North Pole has been known to be surrounded by a hexagonal (6 sides) cloud since discovery in 1987 in data taken by NASA’s Voyager spacecrafts, which quickly flew past the ringed world in the early 1980s. Now, recent observations of Saturn by the Hubble Space Telescope reveal a slightly different geometric cloud pattern around the South Pole: a decagon (10 sides). The geometric boundaries are possibly caused by waves when the fast-moving gas away from the poles interacts with slower-moving gas closer to the poles. In the featured image composite by the Hubble taken last year, the South Pole of Saturn is marked by an X and surrounded by bands of circulating clouds. The decagon appears most prominent in the dark inner regions. The northern hexagon has proven stable for over 40 years, while the stability of the southern decagon will surely remain a topic of research.

https://www.nasa.gov/
https://www.esa.int/
https://www.stsci.edu/
https://science.nasa.gov/mission/hubble/
https://ekoizpen-zientifikoa.ehu.eus/investigadores/128754/detalle
https://www.ehu.eus/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/alyssa-pagan-058170144
https://www.stsci.edu/

Starship Asterisk* • APOD Discussion Page
https://asterisk.apod.com/discuss_apod.php?date=260908

09/07/2026

Introducing a cool new citizen science opportunity!

We need your eyes! 🖥️🌌

Want to help discover some of the faintest galaxies in the Universe?

Introducing Rubin: Blobs and Blurs, a brand-new citizen science project on Zooniverse using data from NSF–DOE Rubin Observatory.

We’re on the hunt for extreme, mysterious galaxies 🌌 Specifically, faint "diffuse dwarf galaxies" and odd "blue blobs," that are dominated by invisible dark matter.

Because these objects are so dim and uniquely shaped, computer algorithms aren't always great at spotting them 🫣

By helping find them, you can help scientists better understand how galaxies form. All you need in order to participate is your curiosity! 🔭✨

🔗 zooniverse.org/rubin

📷: NSF–DOE Rubin Observatory/NOIRLab/SLAC/AURA

09/03/2026

Clear skies, everyone! We hope to see you out at OMSP on 9/19!

08/27/2026

The information that you need to know concerning tonight's (Thursday 08/27/2026) partial lunar eclipse. Clear skies, everyone!