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M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 50-mm binoculars Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate Transparency: fair Seeing: fair
Time: Mon Mar 29 01:00:00 2021 UT Obs. no.: 2240
A few evenings ago, my Brother Anthony & I did some binocular viewing after our computerized telescope malfunctioned. After viewing some binocular double stars we decided to try for The Whirlpool Galaxy. We were both stunned at how easily we were able to observe this galaxy. Soon we will have our telescope up & running again.
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici)
Observer: mihai mataringa (e-mail: mihaimataringa@yahoo.com)
Instrument: 102-mm refractor Location: Prilipeti, Banat, Romania
Light pollution: light Transparency: good Seeing: good
Time: Wed Aug 24 20:20:00 2011 UT Obs. no.: 1875
M51,the Whirlpool galaxy,like a fuzzy patch,difficult.
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 9-inch refractor Location: Hidden Lake Observatory, Mass., United States
Light pollution: none Transparency: excellent Seeing: good
Time: Sun Mar 22 01:00:00 2009 UT Obs. no.: 1819
Last evening my friends Steve Borer, Mike Dzubaty, his son Mike and I went to our friend Ruben Kier's Hidden Lake Observatory north of Colebrook Ct. There was a total of eight guys at this informal star party. We had the use of a 7" and 9" refractor in operation. Limiting magnitude was about 6.2 which meant we had a very dark sky. The first thing we observed was M42 the Orion Nebula. The nebulosity filled the whole field in our eyepiece. We were even able to see M43 quite easily and it was very impressive in its own right. We then observed two planetary nebulas, The Eskimo Nebula and The Jupiter Ghost Nebula. Both planetaries were very blue and I was actually more impressed with The Jupiter Nebula. The Ekimo Nebula did resemble a little eskimo in the sky. We observed one globular cluster, M3. We were able to see many individual stars on the outer edge of M3. But the best part of the night was our observations of the parade of galaxies swarming in the night sky. Our first two galaxies were M65 & 66 in Leo. These galaxies were not impressive because because there was a patch of cirrus clouds in their area. The next two galaxies were M81 & 82 located in Ursa Major. We were able to glimpse the spiral effect of M81 during moments of good seeing. M82 however blew our minds. The dark dust lanes entwined in M82 were outstanding and we were able to see incredible detail in the Galaxy. It was as if we were looking at the galaxy with the hubble telescope. The next galaxy we observed was the great edge on galaxy NGC 4565, The Needle Galaxy. The dust lane going through it was very obvious and the huge edge on could be seen throughout the eye piece. Next we came upon M51 The Whirlpool Galaxy. We were able to see the individual spiral arms very easily and let me tell you words cannot descibe the view. M51 was something to behold and it was easily our best object of the evening. We then went to M64 The Black Eyed Galaxy. The dust lane showing its black eye was great but once again we were utterly shocked when saw the individual spiral arms on the galaxy also, though not as easily as M51. Finally were arrived at NGC 3148 The Little Pin Wheel Galaxy. This galaxy is a face on galaxy that looks like M33 The Pin Wheel Galaxy although smaller in size. This was my first view of this galaxy ever. With binoculars we saw M36, M37, M38, M44, M45 and Bernice's Hair. Our host Ruben Kier has a website www.stardoctor.org. If you visit his website you will see some amazing pictures that he has taken. In fact Ruben will be publishing a new astronomy book that will feature 115 of his best pictures. It should be out in the fall and I for one will be buying a copy. In summery I would have to declare this one of my five best observing experiances ever.
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici)
Observer: Joe Caggiano (e-mail: jcaggiano@mindspring.com, web: http://home.mindspring.com/~jcaggiano/)
Instrument: 70-mm binoculars Location: Promised Land State Park, Pa, USA
Light pollution: none Transparency: excellent Seeing: excellent
Time: Sun Apr 22 06:00:00 2007 UT Obs. no.: 1641
An absolutely beautiful sky adorned the Pocono Mountains this weekend for our annual fishing trip. Moving 3 1/2 off the end star of the handle of Ursa Major I easily spotted M51 a & b. It was surprisingly bright in the binos and I could easily see detail of the whirlpool form. No averted vision was needed to pick out subtle detail with continuously steady skies.
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici)
Observer: Sriram.M.Gubbi (e-mail: sriram_gubbi@yahoo.co.in, web: http://dino.lm.com/artists/display.php?name=sriram_gubbi)
Instrument: 6-inch other Location: Bangalore, Karnataka, India
Light pollution: moderate Transparency: good Seeing: good
Time: Sun Jan 1 04:45:00 2006 UT Obs. no.: 1465
Though a bright galaxy, it was at the limit of visiblity from my light polluted sky. With a faint red sky glow, I just managed to see it through averted vision! I'm sure that the view is going to be far more better in a dark sky where it can show off along with its companion galaxy.
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici, Est. RaDec 8.4)
Observer: Joe Caggiano (e-mail: jcaggiano@mindspring.com)
Instrument: 70-mm binoculars Location: Horsham, Pa, USA
Light pollution: light Transparency: excellent Seeing: excellent
Time: Wed Jun 8 02:30:00 2005 UT Obs. no.: 1243
Decided to take a drive 45 minutes north to Quakertown to see if I could find an area void of light pollution. I ended up at Nockamixon State Park. Viewing up at Ursa Major I spotted M81 and M82. Not as easy to view as in West Va. but still easily prominent. This time I remembered to view M51. Looking just off from the middle of the "handle" I spotted it easily. I could just about make out its spiral arms. With averted vision I could make out both galaxies together. The total size of the group (M51A and M51B) was rather large, but not as large as M101 which I spied next. All in all a good night for galaxy hunting at a location that is much darker than my backyard and is still easily traversible.
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 17.5-inch Dobsonian reflector Location: Colebrook, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: none Transparency: good Seeing: excellent
Time: Sat Jul 26 02:00:00 2003 UT Obs. no.: 848
My friends, Joe Cseh, Mike Dzubaty, Steve Borer and I went on an over nighter to the north west hills of Connecticut. It was truly a galaxy night. With M51 and its companion NGC5195, we were able to see spiral structure. We even glimpsed the the conection of M51 and NGC5195. M81's spiral structure was very easy to see, while the dust lanes in M82 were clearly visable. We observed M31 with 10x50 binoculars. The binocular view could not completely cover M31. Thats how great the skies were. M33 in 10x50,s was really stunning. We also viewed M8 with the 17.5" dob. The nebula seemed to have dark patches in it. M22 globular revealed many individual stars in it. Finally, we had to put a partial cover on the dob so we could observe Mars. The south polar ice cap continues to shrink. My friends confirmed they saw what looked like a polar hood on the north pole. We also observed close to 30 meteors, the ISS twice and one iridium flare of about -5 magnitude. My friend Mike's ten year old sun also had a great time. But when it came to enjoyment, the real winners were the mosquitos that fed on us.
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: 20-inch Dobsonian reflector Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: none Transparency: excellent Seeing: excellent
Time: Sun Mar 17 01:00:00 2002 UT Obs. no.: 620
M51 galaxy is face on. In the 20" dob, the spiral arms of the galaxy showed very well. The branch that conected M 51 to ngc 5195 was seen with great difficulty.
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici, Est. RaDec -)
Observer: Eero Holmstrm (e-mail: holmerkki@altavista.net, web: http://angelfire.com/music/holmerkki/index.html )
Instrument: 8-inch Dobsonian reflector Location: Pernajan kirkonkyl, Pernaja, Finland
Light pollution: light Transparency: good Seeing: good
Time: Sun Apr 9 00:50:00 2000 UT Obs. no.: 525
The spiral structure was quite difficult to make out, probably because of the 4d old moon about 15 degrees up in the sky. It was still definitely there, and awesomely beautiful! The disk clearly has an uneven surface brightness, and some parts of the arms were much brighter from the rest.
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici)
Observer: Mark Stutzman (e-mail: mark@cca.ci.coatesville.pa.us)
Instrument: 4 1/2-inch equatorial reflector Location: Gilbertsville, PA, usa
Light pollution: light Transparency: fair Seeing: fair
Time: Sun Jun 28 03:40:00 1998 UT Obs. no.: 352
I had a friend visiting so I set out to show him as much as I could in an hours time. conditions were the best they've been for quite sometime so off we went. Started at m51 and from there m81,m82. then m57,m27,m13,m92. All so far were very nice indeed. Then we went for m10,m12 and finished out the night with several open clusters in Ophiuchus and scorpius. It was a great hour!!!
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici)
Observer: Joe Muse (e-mail: jmuse@bigfoot.com, web: http://www.geocities.com/capecanaveral/3185)
Instrument: 16-inch Dobsonian reflector Location: Roswell, NM, USA
Light pollution: none Transparency: excellent Seeing: excellent
Time: Wed Oct 29 14:00:00 1997 UT Obs. no.: 242
Great
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici)
Observer: John Callender (e-mail: jbc@west.net, web: http://www.west.net/~jbc/)
Instrument: 8-inch Dobsonian reflector Location: Carpinteria, CA, USA
Light pollution: light Transparency: good Seeing: good
Time: Tue Jun 24 05:45:00 1997 UT Obs. no.: 153
With a fair amount of indirect glare from the neighbor's patio lights and my eyes not yet completely dark-adapted, M51 and NGC 5195 (the companion) were easy at 49x as a pair of fuzzy cores, one bigger and brighter, both with an extended halo that was fairly easy with averted vision, though M51's halo was much larger. I thought I saw a hint of structure in M51's halo, but nothing I could call spiral structure. 49x seemed to give a better view than 122x.
M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy) (Galaxy, in Canes Venatici, Est. RaDec 13h 30m, 47.12)
Observer: Alan Shaffer (e-mail: milkyway@gte.net, web: http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/3693/)
Instrument: 10-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain reflector Location: Mt. Pinos, California, US
Light pollution: none Transparency: excellent Seeing: excellent
Time: Sat Jun 7 10:00:00 1997 UT Obs. no.: 147
What a sight. This large galaxy gumped out under the cool clear skies at @ 104X. I could easily easily see the spiral arms even under low power. It's comapion, NGC 5195 was also easily visable under these beautiful skies. The two were rather bright due to the great seeing. Two beautiful objects.
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