[16th
/ 17th night]
We had been talking
about this trip forever. Tanjung Resang was a
half-hour drive further up north from Teluk Godek
Resort. The isolated gravel road leading to the
observation site is not a well-trespassed one. It
seemed almost amazing that anyone could ever have
suspected the existence of this place which has been
favourably compared to the open skies of Hawaii. I
can understand why now. Ten coconut trees diffused in
an area the size of eight football fields. To the
south, a small hill grew from the otherwise
unobstructing physical landscape. In the east, the
South China Sea dominates. Winds touch the
lovegrass-saturated vicinity, making it rather
chilly. Light-dispersing clouds ride the winds for
most part of the night carrying with them, the threat
of sporadic showers. Under the setting moon, our
shadows drew longer.
In
the distance, thunder rumbled. No one wanted their
equipment to take a shower, so other than binoculars,
the Celestron ShortTube 80 and C90, all the major
league names of Takahashi, Astrophysics, and TMB
stayed comfy and dry in their owner's car. The first
constellation to be recognized was Cassiopeia. At
about the same time, a couple of us spotted the first
meteor for the night. Cheers and claps erupted
spontaneously. The night was still young at 8.30pm
and we all had high hopes of better skies later.
Patches
of stars played hide-and-seek with us behind the
billowing curtains of clouds. A thick thundercloud
smogged the eastern horizon, moving southwest at an
alarming rate. Distant lightning flashed followed by
rumbling echoes. It seemed to be headed our way. We
started to practise scrambling for cover. False
alarm, the storm passed south down the coast without
touching us.
As
the night wore on, the thick fog of clouds started to
disperse revealing the potential of Resang as the
clearest window to the universe I have ever witnessed
to date. I'm beginning to understand the phrase
"diamonds in the skies". The quality cut of
the stars is absolutely brilliant. (De Beers,
Tiffany's and Mondial need polishing up.) Still, no
one brought their equipment out. Everyone seemed to
be waiting for something else. Under these
exceptionally clear seeing conditions, even the small
scopes shine in performance. Naked eye, it was a
picturesque scene. Gradations in the magnitudes of
the stars were remarkably obvious, especially in the
Pleaides where I could see five bright blue-white
stars plus a dimmer one on the side. Using averted
vision, there seemed to be two more in the M45
cluster. The beehive cluster was easily detected, as
were a few other star clusters. The fainter stretch
of the Milky Way from Vela and Carina to Monoceros
was equally discernible. Through the ShortTube 80,
M42 in Orion already had an incredibly detailed
cloud-like structure. The nebula's tendrils fanned
out in distinctive shades. This was something I
thought I'll only be able to see in a picture, not in
a spotting scope. The observed colour was something
of an off-green and grey mix, unlike the
characteristic pink in astrophotographs.
I
am impressed. Suddenly, every other site that I had
ever been to in this region wilted to ashes in
comparison. This is one of the best gateways to
heaven. It is also the most accessible site for the
non-motorist from Singapore.
Standing
out in the open grounds, watching the immediate
transformation in the atmosphere was amazing. The
veiling and unveiling of stars by errant clouds, the
scatter of isolated meteors, inter-cloud and
intra-cloud lightning. Mentally, I set down the
conditions for the ultimate meteor sighting: I
WANT a fireball.. a big, fat, long, colourful and
noisy fireball. As if in
response, a blinding white flash zipped
instantaneously from cloud to earth followed by a
resounding crack. *WHOA!* I reeled back a little,
temporarily blinded as lightning whipped a close-up
surprise on me. It was close. Too close. And whoever
said Nature doesn't have a crack sense of humour. (I
didn't mean *that* kind of fireball! I raised a
mental fist at Nature, who I imagine, no! wait.. who
I hear rolling on the cloudy floor, rumbling away in
laughter.) My friends who'd witnessed my split-second
look of shock were laughing too after I told them
about my dream fireball. *sheesh*
Soon,
I sought refuge in the tent, driven there by the cold
and the unforgiving insects out feasting on us. The
rest of the group kept their eyes peeled for streaks
of light. Meteor sightings (and lightning) were
increasing in volume, causing much ado among us.
Throughout the night, dispersed shouts and
exclamations continued. Two hours later at 3.30am,
there was a major buzz of sudden activity as everyone
scrambled around frantically outside. I couldn't make
out what the commotion was about but before I could
pop my head out of the tent to take a look, Tingchuan
entered the tent. Almost immediately after, I heard a
swooshing sound that was growing louder by the
second. A fierce patter of rain beat down on the
tent. As sudden as it came, it disappeared ten
minutes later. It left quite a few things soaking
wet.
After
this downpour, I stayed out of the tent till dawn. We
were threatened with passing showers two more times
that night. 4am, Leo had risen from the east and
between the few of us, there was almost a meteor
every few minutes. Most of these were springing up
across the constellations (Orion, Canis Major,
Gemini, Taurus, Capella, Cassiopeia, Perseus, Hydra)
surrounding Leo. There were also several
earth-crossing satellites. The meteors we saw
appeared with trails that lasted from one to five
seconds. There were at least two short but fat
meteors leaving smoky trails. (I caught one and heard
about the other.) I was still hoping for my dream of
a fireball, but none materialized. There were a few
random meteors that didn't seem to belong to the
Leonids as they were not radiating away from Leo.
An
hour before the sun, Venus rose with a brilliance
rivaling Sirius in Canis Major. It became an honoured
source of light pollution. Not long after, the final
curtain of clouds fell across the sky and dawn
approached. Now please let the
second night be good.
[17th
/ 18th night]
Eight of us decided
to try out the observing site next to the beach front
at the resort. It was unobstructed from the North to
the Southeast side. Loo had requested for the lights
at the resort to be turned off, which the manager
kindly did. Five scopes were set up on the beach:
Takahashi FS78, Celestron Firstscope, C5, C90 and the
Astrophysics Traveller.
Again,
patchy skies which looked worse than the first night.
Closer to midnight, there was a gap in the clouds and
Jupiter had its break. The scopes were quickly
trained on it. This was one thing I *had* to see
through Loo's Astrophysics. All the circumstances
could be considered ideal. The image of Jupiter was
more than magnificent.
Before
I describe what I saw, I have to admit something:
Other than the pictures that Voyager took of the
planets in our solar system, I have never been
impressed, dazzled, wowed, or struck by any image
with ground-based telescopes before. This would have
to be my first experience, and I am impressed,
dazzled, wowed, AND struck by the image. In all
honesty, even the 6-inch apochromatic scope at the
Science Centre's Observatory was no match. Quite
possibly, this is not a contest of equipment, but of
environmental factors.
Jupiter's
Great Red Spot was easily detected, along with its
two major red bands. There were numerous fainter
bands at the poles. Was I dreaming? I don't think so.
It was almost like looking at an image taken off the
Voyager with probably 30% less details. Colour shades
range from the palest cream yellow to brownish-red.
It looked like an artist's palette with intricately
blended colours that still remained distinctive while
flowing across its cream surface. Now THAT is one
heck of a scope on one heck of a planet.
The
sky fogged over and looked set to stay that way for
the whole night. Lightning, thunder and clouds swept
the eastern expanse with a thick and heavy brush,
signing off our last night at Mersing. The Leonids
weren't too disappointing this time round. There were
many faint meteors but no fireballs. I have a vague
suspicion that we could really be having a storm if
not for the monsoon season. But in comparison to what
I saw last year at Sentosa's Tanjung beach, I have no
complaints.
By
Lin . 20th November 1999, Saturday.
