This coming Monday early evening is an occultation by (276) Adelheid, and I'm hoping the weather clears so I can get at least one chord on the main shadow as well as the lucky chance I also get the moonlet. This event is really for Eastern New England and maybe New York. George Viscome has announced. Any observers in VT, NH or South or East of there could join. The event is a 17:21. Weather is looking iffy.
At our site in Westport, I did a test last Monday to see if we could detect the target star. The sky is likely still too bright to observe from Westport which is West of the main body's predicted shadow. The sun is only 4 degrees below the horizon at Westport at event time. With 20 minutes to target time, I was able to locate Rigel (apparent magnitude 0 - 0.18) which is just below the target in the SE sky, and so synching the scope position was easy to do, but after slewing to the target, I couldn't see a star until just after event time. (Then, to make matters more difficult, the star that was visible was a very close field star.)
If my math is correct, a chord may be accessible at New Haven, so I will try to get a student to do that, and I plan on heading further east, close to the Rhode Island border. Unfortunately, the sky is expected to be overcast through Sunday, so neither the students nor I will be able to practice.?
