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All,<BR>
<BR>
We received a late but welcome entry to the October observer's challenge for NGC-253. Tony Labude from Oklahoma was kind enough to send in his observations. He is a great guy that I met at my first Okie-Tex star party in Ardmore, Oklahoma in 1993. He made those star parties so much more enjoyable that I might have skipped a few of them if not for him.<BR>
<BR>
Fred Rayworth<BR>
<BR>
<P style="LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 6pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><FONT size=3><FONT face="Times New Roman"><B style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal"><SPAN style="mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt">Tony Labude:</SPAN></B><SPAN style="mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt"><SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Observer from Oklahoma<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="LINE-HEIGHT: normal; TEXT-INDENT: 0.5in; MARGIN: 6pt 0in" class=MsoNormal><FONT size=3><FONT face="Times New Roman">Several of he and his friends got to a fairly dark site the 16th & 17th of October with a list of 25 objects including NGC-253.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>He bagged NGC-6717 ( not even on his star maps), M-33 and NGC-604 while waiting for NGC-253 to clear the trees. <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Unfortunately, the 75% humidity brought heavy dew.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>He was still able to find NGC-288 first, then just nudged the scope northwest to the galaxy.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>In the 8" at 55X and terrible transparency, the galaxy had an elongated shape with a bright knot resembling a star in the middle and about 4 foreground stars scattered across the galaxy.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The 25" was set up but not collimated but he took a peek with a 17mm Plossl and was able to make out some dark areas and knots of something.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>He finally had to give up because of the dew on the eyepiece.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The next night was wetter than the first.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>He along with his friends were able to get an image with the FLI 8300C thru an Astro-Tech 80 (see <I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">Wiggly Davis And Labudes NGC-253.jpg</I>)<SPAN style="mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt"><o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></FONT></P>
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