ALERT NEWSLETTER – February 2022

Hi Everyone

Our spring tornado season is just around the corner and now is the time to review your plans and procedures for those storms to come.

Take this time brush up on your skills. Don’t wait until the sirens sound. For by then it may be too late.

In preparing, you should ask yourselves these questions:

Is my family shelter (and everyone should have one) ready?
Is my equipment, both antennae & radios working?
Are the batteries charged?
Are my communications channels still functional? Including RF, Internet & telephone resources.
Can I reliably receive weather watches and warnings?
If you are on the NWSChat or Slack Chat, is your password up to date?
Is your training and knowledge fresh, or do you need to do a quick review?

Are you prepared both at home and at work?

In preparing, remember that keeping yourself and your family alive and intact during and after the storms is your number one priority.

Here’s hoping that your February will be peaceful and safe.

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Blount County Repeaters

Last month I featured the list of repeaters which I have programmed in my Yaesu FT-817ND.

I have since learned of several repeaters in Blount County that I didn’t know about, which I wish to pass along to you.

In addition to the 146.700 MHz Nectar repeater (91.5 Hz tone), some excellent repeaters which you should also add to you lists are:

147.375 Straight Mountain 77.0 Hz tone
442.450 Snead 100.0 Hz tone
442.750 Palisades Park 123.0 Hz Tone
442.875 Pine Mountain 123.0 Hz Tone
443.875 Nectar 123.0 Hz Tone

Special thanks to JR Lowery KK4CWX for providing this list. I appreciate it!

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With the headlines filled with plagues, wars, rumors of wars and calamity…

Just for fun…

The Grand Adventures Of Mister Muff Muff

Some dog people, hopefully not all, and certainly not you, can be a weird lot. With some you could call the owners mother a wanton harlot and it would not faze them in the least, but, let them think that you have hurt poor little Ruffles feelings, usually because the mutt just tore something up, and the owner did nothing about it, and you are now “someone we do not associate with”.

Doris and Phil decide to come over to Aunt Gladys’s house. They also decide to bring their darling English bulldog, known at the shows as Lord Fauntleroy Of Stonevale, but, more affectionately known as Mr. Muff Muff. Because he likes visiting and they know everyone loves seeing little Mr. Muff Muff.

They don’t bother informing Aunt Gladys that they are bringing the 50 pound bulldog, who has a little drooling problem, just little incontinence and more than a little flatulence, since after all everyone looks forward to a visit from Mr. Muff Muff.

I mean, who wouldn’t?

They arrive, and Doris carefully adjusts Mr. Muff Muff’s designer bandana cooing “oh my handsome Boo Bear” as they get out of the car. The first thing Mr. Muff Muff does is run off Aunt Gladys’s cat, Mittens and her kittens to parts unknown. “Mr. Muff Muff, you little imp.” Doris cheerfully says.

That’s about all you can hear though, because Mr. Muff Muff starts barking and growling incessantly at Aunt Gladys, until he sees her reading glasses on the table, which he grabs and promptly chews to pieces. “Mr. Muff Muff, whatever am I going to do with you?” Doris chimes in that sing song voice that makes everyone cringe.

Aunt Gladys mumbles something about a little arsenic, but that isn’t heard, because there is a loud ripping sound from the corner of the room. Sitting in the corner is Great Great Grandma Lucille’s Chair. You know, the one that escaped the fire set when Sherman burned the plantation down in the War Of Northern Aggression.

The cushion that Great Great Grandma’s Lucille’s mother hand sewed in the log cabin is in the finishing process of being ripped to shreds and 185 year old feathers are floating everywhere. “Oh Mr. Muff Muff, you are a naughty little boy, aren’t you?” Doris laughingly says.

About that time Mr. Muff Muff jumps on the new sofa and loses bladder control.

“GET THAT BEAST OUT OF MY HOUSE!” screams Aunt Gladys, causing Mr. Muff Muff to run to the opposite corner leaving a little river across the wool carpet. You know, the imported wool one that Aunt Gladys jokingly told Phil came from a giant sheep in New Zealand and he believed it.

“Well if our precious one is not welcome, then neither are we”, Doris defiantly cries, throwing her head in the air as she stomps out of the door, with Phil cuddling poor Mr. Muff Muff and choking back tears, either due to Mr. Muff Muff’s trauma, or perhaps due to the sulfurous waft left in Mr. Muff Muff’s wake which ia curling the ceiling tiles.

Some years later Aunt Gladys passes away. Doris and Phil proudly declare they won’t “darken the halls of the church for that cruel crone”. No one misses them. They certainly don’t miss Mr. Muff Muff, remembering the incident at Uncle Oscar’s funeral when he tipped the coffin over, with Doris all the while cooing “oh how precious, he wants some ‘Unk Unk’ love”. And, the coffin having landed on Father Dominic’s foot, explains why he walks with a limp to this day.

As expected they get the call from the lawyer about Aunt Gladys’s will. Unexpectedly, it seems Aunt Gladys changed the will and the 250 million she was going to give Doris went to Mittens the Cat instead, along with a letter to Doris explaining in the most exacting detail why.

Mittens and her descendants lived happily ever after at the estate in Maui.

Doris still works the drive through at the Taco World in Picayune to this day.

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Mark’s Almanac

February, or Februarius, as the Romans called it, is named after the Latin term februum, which means “purification”. Ancient Rome celebrated the Februa purification ritual on February 15, which was Full Moon on the old lunar based Latin calendar.

February was not originally included in the Roman calendar, which began in March, but was added, along with January by Numa Pompilius around 713 BC, and until 450 BC was considered the last month of the year.

February was originally 29 days long, but one day was taken and added to August, so the that Emperor Augustus’s month would be equal to Julius Caesar’s month of July. Now only Leap Year, which will next occur in 2024, has 29 days.

Ground Hog Day is on February 2 & believers will watch that flea bitten danged old Yankee Punxsutawney Phil and (if he hasn’t gone to the Great Burrow In The Sky), True Southern Gentleman Birmingham Bill, to see if they see their shadows. If so, prepare for six more weeks of winter.

How did we come up with Groundhog Day anyway?

It is said by one theory that the first day of Spring is about six weeks after Groundhog Day, on March 20 or 21. 1000 years ago when the world used the Julian calendar, Spring Equinox fell on March 16, which is exactly six weeks after February 2. So, if the groundhog saw his shadow on Groundhog Day there would be six more weeks of winter. But, if he didn’t, there would be only 42 more days of winter left instead. Get the calculator out and you will find that 42 days equals six weeks, so Groundhog Day may have started out as a practical joke.

The modern 21 Century version blurs this into saying that if a groundhog emerges from its burrow and fails to see its shadow, winter will soon end. If not, it will return into its burrow, and the winter will continue for 6 more weeks.

It is believed that the Germans in Pennsylvania brought Groundhog Day with them.

 

Morgantown, Pennsylvania storekeeper James Morris’ diary entry for Feb. 4, 1841 states “Last Tuesday, the 2nd, was Candlemas day, the day on which, according to the Germans, the Groundhog peeps out of his winter quarters and if he sees his shadow he pops back for another six weeks nap, but if the day be cloudy he remains out, as the weather is to be moderate.”

So, how accurate is the little goomer?

Well, Groundhog Day believers claim a 75% to 90% accuracy rate. The National Climatic Data Center, on the other hand, says it’s more like 39%.

But, you know how Heathens can be.

If the NCDC is right, maybe they can still use the critter anyway, by flipping the theory around, so if he predicts warmth, you go with winter & vice versa.

I think this is called “Inverse Forecasting”. Or it should be anyway.

In the Southern Hemisphere February is the equivalent of August. But, for us, February is a cold month with more snow falling in February than in any other month.

Statistically speaking, there is a 70% chance of snow flurries, and a 57% chance of snow up to one inch. There is a 13% chance of over one inch, and a 3% chance of 4 inches or more.

There is hope on the horizon though, as the worst of winter weather is usually over by February 15.

North Atlantic Tropical activity is at a minimum. From 1851 to 2021 there has been only one Tropical Storm to occur, 70 MPH Tropical Storm #1, which affected Florida on February 2 & 3, 1952.

Days grow longer as the Sun’s angle above the noonday horizon rapidly increases from 39.5 degrees at the beginning of the month to 48.6 degrees at the end. Daylight increases from 10 hours 35 minutes on February 1 to 11 hours 26 minutes on February 28.

Sunrise and sunset times for Birmingham are:

February 1 Sunrise 6:44 AM Sunset 5:18 PM
February 14 Sunrise 6:33 AM Sunset 5:31 PM
February 28 Sunrise 6:17 AM Sunset 5:43 PM

Looking skyward, the Sun, magnitude -26.8 is in Capricornus.

At the beginning of the month Mercury, magnitude +4.6 in Capricornus, is rising higher in the predawn sky.

On February 16 Mercury will reach his highest point above the eastern horizon or “Greatest Western Elongation, 26.3 degrees from the Sun. This is the best time to view Mercury since he will be at his highest point above the horizon in the morning sky. Look for the planet low in the eastern sky just before sunrise

Having emerged from the sunrise, after passing between the Earth and Sun, with his unilluminated side turned towards the Earth, he has reemerged as a thin, barely illuminated crescent. As the weeks proceed, this crescent will wax and becomes gibbous.

Since Mercury can only be observed in twilight, he is particularly difficult to find when he is in the thin crescent phase. So, he will be significantly easier to see in the days after he reaches his highest point in the sky, when he will show a gibbous phase, than in the days beforehand.

Venus, magnitude -4.7 in Sagittarius, shines brilliantly in the predawn morning sky reaching her greatest brilliancy for 2022 on February 9th.

On that date she will rise at 4:04 AM, 2 hours and 31 minutes before the Sun at an altitude of 23° above the south-eastern horizon before fading from view as dawn breaks around 06:19 AM.

If you get a chance, get up early, sip a little coffee and take a look at our bright neighbor, for she won’t appear this bright again until July 2023.

She will reach her highest altitude of 27 degrees above the horizon on February 21, blazing in darkness and into the pink twilight sky.

In a small telescope she is a dazzling thin crescent, getting a little thicker and smaller each day.

Earth, magnitude -4.0, as viewed from the Sun, is in the Constellation Leo.

Mars, magnitude +1.5 on the far side of his orbit from us in Sagittarius, is emerging from behind the Sun, low in the east-southeastern sky.

He rises two hours before sunrise and will reach the horizon at 5:55 AM.

Autumnal Equinox will occur in Mars northern hemisphere, and Vernal Equinox in the southern hemisphere on February 24.

Dwarf Planet Ceres, magnitude 8.3, is in Taurus.

Jupiter , magnitude –2.0, in Aquarius, still shines brightly in the southwest at dusk, a little lower every day. He will soon disappear into the glow of the Sun.

Saturn, magnitude +0.8 in Capricornus, will pass behind the Sun on February 4 and will emerge very low in the east-southeast morning twilight in mid-February.

Uranus, magnitude 5.8, is in Aries, north of the head of Cetus the Sea Monster, is very high in the south-southwest in early evening. He will set around midnight.

In binoculars Uranus is a little pinpoint “star” and in small telescopes with sharp optics, high power and a spell of good seeing, a tiny, fuzzy ball.

Neptune, magnitude 7.8, in Aquarius, is hidden in the glow of the Sun

Dwarf Planet Pluto, with his five moons shines at a dim 14.4 in Sagittarius.

Dwarf Planet 136108 Haumea, her ring and moons Hiʻiaka and Namaka, shines at a faint magnitude of 17.4 in Bootes.

Haumea, discovered in December 2004, is the goddess of fertility and childbirth in Hawaiian mythology.

Dwarf Planet 136472 Makemake with his moon S/2015 (136472) faintly shines at magnitude 17.2 in Coma Berenices.

Makemake is the creator of humanity and god of fertility in the myths of the Rapa Nui, the native people of Easter Island.

After its discovery on March31, 2005, Makemake was given the official provisional designation 2005 FY9 when the discovery was made public. Before that, the discovery team used the nickname “Easterbunny” for the object, because of its discovery shortly after Easter.

Dwarf Planet 136199 Eris and her moon Dysnomia is barely visible in the most powerful telescopes at magnitude 18.8 in Cetus the Sea Monster.

Eris, discovered in January 2005, is named after the Greek goddess of strife and discord. Her Roman equivalent is Discordia, which means the same. Eris’s Greek opposite is Harmonia, whose Roman counterpart is Concordia.

Dysnomia is from the Ancient Greek word Δυσνομία meaning “anarchy & lawlessness” and is the daughter Eris.

Eris was initially labeled by NASA as the “Tenth Planet” and was temporarily named “Xena” after TV’s “Xena The Warrior Princess” and her moon “Gabrielle”, after Xena’s sidekick.

At least four additional bodies meet the preliminary criteria for identifying dwarf planets, and though not “officially” declared as such, are generally called dwarf planets by astronomers as well.

The unofficial official list includes:

50000 Quaoar, magnitude +18.6 in Ophiucus, was discovered June 5, 2002 and announced October 7 of that year. Quaoar has one known moon named Waywot.

Quaoar was temporarily nicknamed “Object X” as a reference to Planet X, due to its potentially large size and unknown nature.

Both objects were eventually named after mythological figures from the Native American Tongva people in Southern California. Quaoar is the Tongva creator deity and Weywot is his son.

90377 Sedna, magnitude +20.7 in Taurus, was discovered November 14, 2003 and announced March 15, 2004.

Sedna was nicknamed “The Flying Dutchman”, or “Dutch”, after a legendary ghost ship, because its slow movement had initially masked its presence from researchers.

Because it is the coldest, most distant place known in the Solar System, it was decided to name the object “Sedna” honor of Sedna, the Inuit goddess of the sea, who is thought to live at the bottom of the frigid Arctic Ocean.

90482 Orcus, magnitude 19.1 between Hydra and Serpens, was discovered February 17, 2004 and announced two days later. Orcus has one known moon, named Vanth.

Orcus is very similar to Pluto, both in size and orbit, and since Pluto is the god of the underworld, they kept with the theme naming this object Orcus.

Orcus was a god of the underworld, punisher of broken oaths in Etruscan and Roman mythology. As with Hades, the name of the god was also used for the underworld itself.

Vanth, was named after a winged female demon of the Etruscan underworld. She could be present at the moment of death, and frequently acted as a psychopomp, a guide of the deceased to the underworld.

Not a heifer you exactly want to mess with.

225088 Gonggong, +21.5 magnitude in Aquarius, was discovered July 17, 2007 and announced January 2009. Gonggong has one moon, Xiangli.

Initially nicknamed the object “Snow White” for its presumed white color as it was assumed to be ice covered, Gongong is the Chinese water god responsible for chaos, floods and the tilt of the Earth. Xiangliu, was a nine-headed poisonous snake monster in Chinese mythology that attended the water god Gonggong as his chief minister.
Gonggong was recognized as a dwarf planet by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and NASA in May 2016.

Elsewhere, 4903 planets beyond our solar system have now been confirmed as of January 10, per NASA’s Exoplanet Archive http://exoplanetarchive.ipac.caltech.edu/

New Moon occurs February 1 at 5:48 UTC when the Moon will on the same side of the Earth as the Sun and will not be visible in the night sky. This is the best time of the month to observe faint objects such as galaxies and star clusters because there is no moonlight to interfere.

Now. this month we have a situation in which the New Moon is occurring in two months at the same time, as 5:48 UTC February 1st is also 11:48 CST on January 31.

If you have two New Moons in a month, or a “the third New Moon in a season with four New Moons”, the second New Moon is unofficially called by some a “Black Moon”.

So, from Alabama westward it will be a January 31 Black Moon, from Georgia eastward, just a New Moon.

To help further complicate things further, February is a short month, having only 28 days this year, so there will not be another New Moon for Alabama until March. So, technically Alabama eastward will experience a February without a New Moon, which only happens every 19 years, and only in February. This has also been tagged the name “Black Moon”.

Either way, we are going to have one, (or is it two?) Black Moons. One on January 31 and not having a New Moon in February, a second one.

First Quarter Moon, or when the moon has only the Western side illuminated, will occur February 8.

During the Quarter Moons the Moon is only 10% as bright as a Full Moon.

The Moon will be at Apogee or its farthest distance from Earth on February 10, when she will be 251,591 miles from Earth.
Full Moon will occur February 16 at 10:59 AM CST or 16.59 UTC. The Moon will be located on the opposite side of the Earth as the Sun and its face will be fully illuminated. February’s Full Moon is “Full Snow Moon” in Native American folklore, since the heaviest snows usually fall at this time of year. Since the harsh weather made hunting difficult, some tribes called it “Full Hunger Moon”.

Last Quarter Moon, or when the moon has only the Eastern side illuminated, will occur February 23.

The Moon will be at Perigee or her closest approach to Earth on February 3, when she will be 228,532 miles from Earth.

The February sky is alit with bright stars. Orion the Hunter is overhead, along with his faithful hunting dogs, Canis Major & Canis Minor, the Large & Lesser Dogs. In Canis Major is the blue star Sirius, The Dog Star, which 8.6 light years away, is the brightest star in the night sky.

February and March are the best times of the year for seeing the Zodiacal Light. In the evening away from city lights and after twilight has faded you might see a faint, roughly triangular, whitish glow near the sunset point. This is Zodiacal Light, which is formed by the sunlight reflecting off millions of minute particles of cosmic dust aligned with the Earth’s orbital plane.

A kindred, but much fainter glow is the “Counterglow” or “Gegenschein”. This is a glow in the night sky directly opposite the Sun caused by sunlight being reflected by dust and particles in the disk shaped interplanetary dust cloud which lies along the plane of the Solar System. These particles are the debris from comet and asteroid collisions.

To see the Gegenschein you must look around midnight in very dark, non-light polluted skies. In February it is located near base of the head of Leo The Lion.

You will probably have to use “averted vision”, a trick astronomers use to see faint objects.

Averted vision is a technique for viewing faint objects which uses your peripheral vision instead of looking directly at the object.

This technique compensates for fact that the retina of the human eye has virtually no rods, the cells which detect dim light in black and white near the focal point of the eye, but, has mostly cone cells, which serve as bright light and color detectors and are not as useful during the night.
This situation results in a decrease in visual sensitivity in central field of vision at night.

But by looking as an object a little off to the nasal side of the field of view, which avoids the possibility that the object will be imaged on the blind spot, which everyone has at approximately 15 degrees on the cheek side of the field of vison, you can use the most light sensitive part of the eye, which is around 20 degrees off the center of vision.

For right-eyed observers it is best to shift to the right, and for left-eye observers it is best to shift to the left.

I have used this technique for many years and though it can be frustrating not being able to look directly at an object, as they tend to disappear from view when you look directly at them, it does work, and the object appears brighter. This is especially useful for observing diffuse objects such as galaxies, comets and nebulae.

You should give your eyes time to adapt to the dark. It can take typically 7 minutes for your eyes to become used to darkness and up to 30 minutes to become totally adjusted to the dark conditions of observing.

Care should be taken not to ruin this dark adaptation by being exposed to bright lights, such as headlights from passing cars, flashlights or moonlight. Lights with red filters will not harm the eyes sensitivity.

Relaxing your eyes also helps. By straining at objects or squinting eyes we place stress on them which makes it harder for the eye to refocus on objects. By relaxing our eyes when we look through a telescope or by using an eye patch we can improve our vision.

An eyepatch also helps preserve dark adapted eyesight. There is a theory that the reason so many pirates are depicted as wearing eyepatches isn’t that they typically had the worst of luck in combat with all of them losing an eye, but rather they were preserving their “night eye” so that when they went below the deck, which was very poorly lit, they could still see.

Very few people have actually seen the Gegenschein, for finding a dark enough sky can be a challenge. The least light polluted skies in Alabama are in a crescent shaped area of west Alabama from west of Tuscaloosa to near the Mississippi border and north and south of that line. An especially good area is southwest Alabama from south of Tuscaloosa to north of Mobile. Another area is southeast of Montgomery towards Eufaula.

Light Pollution Map – DarkSiteFinder.com

For the Gegenschein’s position for other months see:

https://earthsky.org/upl/2020/03/Screen-Shot-2020-03-02-at-11.19.39-AM-e1583166166450.png

Another sight to look for which is much more common is the Earth Shadow. At sunset, on very clear days, as the sun goes farther below the horizon, you will see what appears to be a layer of gray cloud rising along the eastern horizon. This is actually the silhouette of the earth’s shadow being cast against darkening sky, sometimes with a pinkish glow along the edge. It fades as twilight fades into darkness.

The pink fringe, which is technically called an “anti-twilight arch” was called in Victorian times “The Belt of Venus” or “Venus’s Girdle” and the shadow itself being “the dark segment”.

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This month’s meeting will be on February 8 at 7PM.

The meeting will be done remotely as was last month’s meeting. Details and instructions will be issued as the time nears.

I hope to see you there!

Finally, we are in need for weather, radio & emergency communications related articles for this newsletter. Any help at all will be appreciated.

Mark Wells
WD4NYL & WRJE893

Editor
ALERT Newsletter
Wd4nyl@bellsouth.net