Notices by David Dickinson (astrodave@astrodon.social)

Always a fascinating astronomy history video to watch: Here's a silent movie of the first (unsuccessful) pouring of the 200-inch Pyrex disk for the Hale telescope at the Palomar Observatory #OnThisDay 1936 by Corning Glass Works in New York: https://youtu.be/KdqaC8pLixY?si=-zOKicIQGQlX2QSG

Corning would be successful on the second try, and Palomar saw first light observing NGC 2261 on January 26th, 1949. The legacy of George Ellery Hale (who passed away in 1938), it was the biggest optical telescope in the world right up until 1976. They really were pushing the technology of the era to its limit.

The Sun ends a busy year as we close out 2024; the year saw the approaching climax of solar maximum for Solar Cycle Number 25 as we cross into 2025. 2024 also saw no less than two historic space weather events, sending aurora to lower latitudes where such sights are rare. Will 2025 produce more of the same?

For a third year in a row, the Earthward face of Sol had zero spotless days, and the monthly sunspot number average hit a very respectable high value of 215 in August. For context, the highest sunspot numbers ever recorded were over 500 in 1870 and 1957, and the highest value recorded thus far for the 21st century was 352 on March 27th, 2001.

https://www.sidc.be/article/high-sunspot-numbers

Here’s a great solar image courtesy of Eliot Herman to close out the year:

Am officially jealous… astrophotographer Eliot Herman ventured to Easter Island this past week, to catch the October 2nd annular solar eclipse. He came back with some amazing images, not only of the annular eclipse, but the massive stone Moai at sunrise and brightening Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS at dawn. This was the final eclipse of 2024, and we’re now losing the comet this weekend as it sinks towards the Sun. Check out Eliot’s Flickr page for more: https://www.flickr.com/photos/eliot_photos/

The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) launched a PSLV rocket from Satish Dhawan Space Center #OnThisDay 2023, with India’s first solar observatory mission, Aditya-L1: https://youtu.be/udvuXFdr9fk?si=Z7CkXT7WThPerPZ3

The mission is now in the end of its first year of science operations for its five year nominal mission. You can see recent images from the mission’s SUIT (Solar Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope) online: https://suit.iucaa.in/sunlatest.html

Ancient redwoods recover from fire by sprouting 1000-year-old buds - Via Science.Org - Amazing, that these ancient trees have a survival strategy for this sort of stress: https://www.science.org/content/article/ancient-redwoods-recover-fire-sprouting-1000-year-old-buds

Cosmic blast seared Earth’s atmosphere from 2 billion light-years away - Via Science.Org - https://www.science.org/content/article/cosmic-blast-seared-earth-s-atmosphere-2-billion-light-years-away - Said BOAT (Biggest Of All Time) Gamma-Ray blast struck Earth on October 9th, 2022.

A Mexican Journalist Went Viral After He Presented ‘Alien Bodies’ to Congress. Now He Is Accused of Plundering Them From Ancient Sites - Via ArtNet - https://news.artnet.com/art-world/mexico-aliens-archeology-2368315 - Plus, the presenters have a history of fraud, mentioned in the article.

Hello. We have a new comet that could reach naked eye visibility over the next few weeks: C/2023 P1 Nishimura, discovered by Hideo Nishimura observing from Kakegawa, Japan on August 11th. Currently at +9th magnitude (with a bullet) in the constellation Gemini, the comet is well-placed in the pre-dawn sky. The comet is expected to brighten to +2 magnitude in early September, when it passes 0.29 AU from the Earth on September 13th, and reaches perihelion 0.22 AU from the Sun on September 18th.