This meeting is cancelled due to weather – Elections will be held in January and “Show and Tell” will be booked for another time in the future.
NOVAC Members,
Our next meeting will be Sunday Evening, December 8, 7:00 pm with an equipment “show and tell” event with NOVAC members bringing their astronomy equipment for others to see.  You will be able to talk with the equipment owners about how and why they use what they have for observing.  We will meet in Room 163,  Research Hall, George Mason University. Check the web page, http://www.novac.com/meetings/, if you need directions and details.
We are looking for members to bring their equipment like last year. Â Email webmaster@novac.com (and the list for that matter) to let us know what you are planning on bringing.
Also, bring along whatever you use to power your equipment (unless it is your automobile!) so that attendees can see the creative ways folks get power to their scopes and mounts and accessories.
If you are setting up equipment to show, please try to arrive between 6:15 and 6:45 to setup your things.
We will also have light refreshments in the spirit of making this a social event to honor all of our volunteers that served NOVAC so well during the past year.
We will elect officers for 2014 at our December NOVAC Meeting. Â Candidate nominations have been received for each position. Â If you wish to run for one of the officer or trustee positions, please self-nominate by emailing your desire to do so at this email address: Â elections@novac.com
We look forward to you coming to attend this fun NOVAC meeting!
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Geminids
The final major meteor shower of every year (unless one surprises us!) is always the December Geminid shower, often producing 50 or more meteors per hour. It is a beloved shower, because, as a general rule, it’s either the August Perseids or the December Geminids that give us the most prolific display of the year. The Geminid meteor shower will reach its maximum rate of activity. Some meteors will be visible each night from 7 Dec to 16 Dec, but the best show will be on this evening. The maximum number of meteors expected to be visible from a dark location is around 100 per hour (ZHR). The Moon will be 11 days old at the time of peak activity, and being so close to Full Moon, will severely limit the observations that will be possible.
December’s Full Moon is the “Oak Moon”, “Cold Moon”, “Frost Moon”, “Long Night’s Moon”, “Moon Before Yule”, or “Margashira Poornima.
The winter solstice is the shortest day of the year, respectively, in the sense that the length of time elapsed between sunrise and sunset on this day is a minimum for the year. Of course, daylight saving time means that the first Sunday in April has 23 hours and the last Sunday in October has 25 hours, but these human meddlings with the calendar and do not correspond to the actual number of daylight hours.
http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/astronomy/WinterSolstice.html
Great viewing for 2014 as this is right next to the dark (new) moon. Look for meteors radiating from the constellation Bootes. The Quadrantid meteor shower will reach its maximum rate of activity. Some meteors will be visible each night from 1 Jan to 6 Jan, but the best show will be on this evening. The maximum number of meteors expected to be visible from a dark location is around 80 per hour (ZHR). The Moon will be 22 days old at the time of peak activity, and so will present minimal interference.
This is the best day of the year to view Jupiter, as it makes it’s closest approach to Earth and will be fully reflecting light from the sun. There will also be plenty of light reflecting off of its four largest moons: Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto. These will be visible on both sides of the planet.
January’s Full Moon is the “Old Moon”, “Wolf Moon”, “Ice Moon”, “Moon after Yule”, or “Paush Poornima”