NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: Brad Morris
Date: 2016 Apr 21, 20:32 -0400
I gave it an attempt at 5:55 PM from the eastern end of Long Island. There were some wispy clouds in the atmosphere.
Sunset is at 7:43 PM for the central meridian of the time zone. For my longitude, it's roughly 9 minutes ahead of that time, or 7:34 PM.
So with 1 hour 39 minutes ahead of sunset, I let the SkyScout point where it wanted. The altitude was above the point of Jupiter being extinguished in horizon haze. There were no trees or other obstructions. The sun was easily well away from Jupiter.
I saw nothing. Mark One Eyeballs saw nothing but blue sky and wispy clouds.
I'll try again tomorrow, closer to actual sunset.
Frank, may I ask again what the point of this exercise is?
Brad
Brad Morris, you wrote:
"It's not magic."Very true! But is it helpful in the way that Peter was suggesting? The pointing accuracy of the Sky Scout is excellent, right? I know you've described in the past that it's impressive. If you still own one, maybe you could try it this afternoon and evening. The forecast for southern New England and Long Island looks good. If you search for Jupiter with the Sky Scout, can you (or can someone with excellent vision --find a kid; they're good at this!) spot it visually 15-30 minutes before sunset? If so, then it's as good as having the Moon in the sky as a fixed point. I would still recommend doing this with some high tree branches: use the device to walk to a spot where Jupiter should be perfectly aligned with the tip of a branch and then search visually.
Frank Reed
