Ed's Observed Lunar Grazes

These pages contain descriptions and pictures of Lunar grazes which I have witnessed myself

El Nath, Beta Tauri, SAO 77168

2006 September 14, 13:08 UT (6:08 AM PDT)

At a visual magnitude of 1.7, El Nath is by far the most spectacular graze I have witnessed and video recorded. I traveled to the observation spot to join a team of several other observers from the San Francisco bay area. I was able to video record several events.

Start of Graze Events: Low Bandwidth Video (1.2 MB wmv), High Bandwidth Video (4.3 MB wmv)

End of Graze Events: Low Bandwidth Video (1.5 MB wmv), High Bandwidth Video (4.3 KB wmv)

SkyMap Pro Map (Wide View), SkyMap Pro Map (Close up)

Low Bandwidth Video of entire graze (4.5 MB wmv), High Bandwidth Video of entire graze (22.1 MB wmv)

Additional pictures, LiMovie plots & analysis, and detailed times can be found on the El Nath Graze page. The following night I went mobile again to record the occultation of a star by the asteroid Vibilia. These two expeditions were sandwiched by two ISS/Atlantis Solar Transits which I recorded from home.

SAO 78302

2005 September 25, 11:34 UT (4:34 AM PDT)

I was able to record to video 6 events for this graze. Details follow:

Disappearance at 11:33:25.6, Reappearance at 11:33:40.8, Disappearance at 11:33:55.8. Video (1.59 MB)

Reappearance at 11:34:27.6, Disappearance at 11:34:31.4. Video (516 KB)

Reappearance at 11:35:32.5. Video (408 KB)

SkyMap Pro Map (Wide View), SkyMap Pro Map (Close up), Google Earth Map of observing Site (Wide View), Google Earth Map of observing Site (Close up)

Video of entire graze (4.93 MB)

Upsilon Geminorum

2005 April 16, 4:39 UT (April 15, 9:39 PM PDT)

A team of 15 set up in Fremont, California to observe this graze of 4.1 mag Upsilon Geminorum. I was able to record to video the following events:

Abrupt disappearance at 04:38:26.7. Video (467 KB)

Gradual reappearance from 04:39:12.4 to 04:39:13.0 followed by gradual disappearance from 04:39:13.0 to 04:39:14.3. The Star did not reappear to full magnitude, but to a fainter magnitude, possibly due to the reappearance of one of the secondary stars in this system. Possible step events here. Video (646 KB)

Flash event to a much fainter magnitude that the primary star at 04:39:40.3. Video (475 KB)

Flash event to a fainter magnitude at 04:40:08.0. Possible step events here as well. Video (646 KB)

Reappearance as step events, first to a fainter magnitude at 04:40:24.8, followed by full magnitude reappearance at 04:40:25.2. Video (646 KB)

SkyMap Pro Map (Wide View), SkyMap Pro Map (Close up), Map of observing Site (Wide View), Map of observing Site (Close up)

Video of entire graze (4.9 MB)

Upsilon Tauri

2003 September 17, 7:47 UT (12:47 AM PDT)

A team of 4 set up in California's San Joaquin Valley to observe this graze of 4.3 mag Upsilon Tauri. I was able to record to video 13 events, including some events for the 6.5 mag close binary (Separation 0.020"). The video below shows the first 13 seconds of the graze which includes the following 5 events:

Disappearance at 07:47:25.0

Reappearance, 6.3 seconds later

Disappearance of 4.3 Mag. Primary, 2.8 seconds later

Disappearance of 6.5 Mag. Secondary, 0.6 seconds later

Flash of 6.5 Mag. Secondary, 1.1 seconds later

SkyMap Pro Map (Wide View), SkyMap Pro Map (Close up), Map of observing Site (Wide View), Map of observing Site (Close up)

Video (5.5 MB)

For additional information regarding the importance of observing lunar grazes, visit the International Occultation Timing Association web-site. Predictions via David Herald's WinOccult Software. Light Measurement Analysis via LiMovie Software.

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