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Next Public Star Gaze

Image credit: club member Alan Davis – taken at Lookout Observatory

Continue to check this home page as weather could change the venue or postpone and possibly cancel a star gaze. Check again after 5:00 p.m. on the afternoon of the observing session for the latest info and update.

Friday, April 25, 10:10 a.m. update: Unfortunately, a cloudy forecast has caused the postponement of tonight’s star gaze at Lookout Obs. to the backup date of Saturday night, April 26. Please check this home page for another weather update on Saturday.

25 April 2025 — Friday night — The location for this star gaze will be Lookout Observatory on the UNC Asheville campus, with a weather backup date of Saturday, 26 April.
Due to water damage in the observatory building, the primary telescopes will not be available for this star gaze. However, a number of quality, portable telescopes will be set up for visitors to observe celestial objects.
While the event is free and open to everyone, pre-registration is required to attend. To learn more about how to register, please visit the UNCA Lookout Observatory website here. Sunset occurs at 8:11 p.m., with shuttle service beginning about 8:50 p.m.

30 April 2025
– The Moon Passes over Jupiter

Illustration created with SkySafari and PowerPoint software

1 May 2025 – Club Meeting Presentation
— Thursday night, 7:00 – 8:30 p.m.

This free speaker presentation will be offered in-person at the
UNC-Asheville Reuter Center and virtually online. Registration is not required; use this Zoom link to watch the presentation remotely.

Although parking for this meeting at the Reuter Center is free, you must register your vehicle with a “visitor daily” permit at this link. Once registration is complete, visitors will not need to print or display a permit; the new system utilizes camera-based License Plate Recognition technology. All vehicles must park front-end in, so that the license plate is visible.

Microquasars: Black Holes, Superfast Jets, and Fun Physics

– presented by
Diana Hannikainen, Ph.D.,
Editor in Chief, SKY & TELESCOPE

Microquasars are small-scale analogs of distant quasars — instead of a supermassive black hole accreting matter from its host galaxy, microquasars consist of a stellar-mass black hole accreting matter from a companion star.
Read more…