My April Observing Highlights!

April has turned out to be a great month for observing with a very large number of clear nights from Maghera. Of note was the 3 days in a row of amazing atmospheric phenomena which i will begin with now...

ATMOSPHERICS

* Five 22* Sun haloes

* Eight sets of twin 22* sundogs (all spectacular)

* four Upper Tangent Arcs

* Two Circumzenithal arcs

* Three twin sections of Parhelic cirlce (sundog tails)

* A new 9*? sun halo (Conor)

* One 44* Sun Halo

* Two sun Pillars

* Numerous bright crepuscular sun rays

* Three Moon Pillars

* Two nights of elusive crepuscular Moon rays

* Irridescent clouds observed

* A selection of spectacular rainbows with bright prim and sec bows and vivid supernumerary arcs. Also see n my first near blood red 'sunset' rainbow!

* One naked eye sunspot

NIGHT SKY

* One bright short duration Aurora Display

* My last observation of the Gegenschein

* EAAS talk by Apostolos Christtou from Armagh Observatory

* Three nights of observation of Nova Cygni 2006

* Numerous observations of C/2006 A1 POJMANSKI

* Continous nightly observations of 73P/ SW3 fragments C and B including the outburst of B and the first naked eye sighting of C

* Four nights observing the Lyrid meteor shower including a night with the EAAS at Killylane with 18 members.

* Two spectacular Lyrid fireballs observed 15 mins apart with first FB casting shadows at mag - 12 (Full Moon) and leaving a 1 min duration glowing twisted smoke trail (also seen by John Mc Connell).

* ISS observations and images (incuding an Iridum flare which cast shaows)

* 5 Hours 17 mins of comet hunting bringing my total count to 895 hours 25mins with 3134 telescopic satelllites and 271 telescopic meteors crossing the FOV.

May looks to be just as exciting with 73P reaching its peak and hopefully the first NLC displays which i look forward to very much.

Clear skies