TVS presents

   If you have ever wanted to view the solar disk and its surrounding atmosphere visually, be sure to attend our February general meeting. Leonard Higgins and Fred Veio will present their hand-crafted spectroheliograph. For a preview of their instrument in use, see the photograph on page 6 of this newsletter.

   Using this instrument, a solar observer can watch detailed changes occurring over the Sun's surface and in the gasses of the chromosphere. Prior to the invention of the spectroheliograph earlier this century, such careful solar analysis could only be conducted during a total eclipse. 

The enormous solar prominence visible in the upper right quadrant of this image is so large that 28 Earth diameters would span the space. Expanding at thousands of miles per hour, this eruption was captured by the extreme-ultraviolet imaging telescope aboard SOHO, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory.  (Photo credit: NASA)

"Dear Mr. Dave,"

   As a Project ASTRO volunteer astronomer, club president Dave Anderson taught five sessions for a science class at Hopkins Junior High School in Fremont. Dave received some wonderful and amusing thank you letters for his efforts. We excerpt a few of those here for your enjoyment.

   I was really clueless about the distance between the Moon and the Earth especially, because on TV programs they show the Moon orbiting really close around Earth. (Jane Yu)
Continued on Page 5

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