21/22 April 2025
– Lyrid Meteor Shower Peaks
Illustration courtesy of
SKY & TELESCOPE
Next Public Star Gaze
Image credit: club member Jerry Sherman – taken at Grassland Mtn. 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.
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…
1-7 May 2025
– The Moon and Mars Visit the Beehive Star Cluster
Illustration created with SkySafari and PowerPoint software