November Events

Dr. Ivan Linscott will be our speaker at the November 4th General Meeting. The time is 8 p.m. and the location is Hogue Park. His talk is on Radio Beacon Remote Sensing within the Solar System. Dr. Linscott worked on the REX instrument (Radio Science Experiment) that is on the New Horizons spacecraft headed toward Pluto. This will be used to measure atmospheric composition and temperature of Pluto, Charon and possibly other Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs). See more info on page 2.

The annual swap meet is a great place to find bargains and to help your favorite amateur astronomy club. It is on Sunday, November 5 starting at noon. This is also at Hogue Park. See the swap meet article on page 2.

On November 8, Mercury will transit the Sun. A good place to see it (weather permitting) is Hogue Park. If you miss this one, the next one is May of 2016. See more about this on page 3.

The eighth year of the Silicon Valley Astronomy Lecture Series got off to a rousing start in October when Alex Filippenko gave his talk on Dark Energy. The next lecture is on Pluto and will be given by Dale Cruikshank. See the article on page 5 for more details.