62 AUSTRALIAN SKY & TELESCOPE November | December 2017

&

16 Pisces, Arp 284

the

Unexpected Quasar

T

ravelingtoobservewithJimiLowreymakesfor

alongday.

It starts with two flight segments over six hours,

whereuponSteveGottliebandIthenrentacarforthethree-

hourfinaldrive,sobythetimewearriveatJimi’splace,

we’retired.Butthatexhaustionevaporatesquicklyinhis

observatory,withtheskydarkeningandhis1.2-metre(48-

inch)telescopereadyforaction.

The1.2-misanalt-azf/4Newtonianreflectorcontrolled

withalaptopcomputer.Withthescopeanglednearly

horizontally when the observatory roof is closed, its back

end,whichsupportstheexquisitelyfiguredprimarymirror,

is almost taller than I am. Best of all, this impressively large

and well-made telescope is optimised for visual observing.

Weneeda5-metre-tallorchardladdertoreachthe

eyepiece when the scope points near the zenith. The ladder

getsalarminglynarrowatthetop,andit’shardnottofeel

howhighoffthefloorIamupthere.It’s‘onehandformyself

Arp 284

15

16

h

19

PISCES

23 h 40 m

+3°

23 h 45 m 23 h 35 m

+2°

Star magnitudes

6

5

7

8

9

10

and one for the scope’ when I’m adjusting the focus or using

the hand pad to move the telescope slightly. Although I’m

sure there’s a slight impression of my right hand somewhere

on the ladder, observing from the top isn’t impossibly scary.

It’s difficult to see how high off the observatory floor I am in

the dark, plus the view through the eyepiece is wonderfully

distracting.

As you might guess, observing through the 1.2-m under

a dark rural sky is as good as it gets for a visual observer, so

there’s no use being scared. Everyone climbs the ladder. Plus,

the company is great.

On our most recent trip there in October 2016, Steve and

I came prepared with our observing lists and had every hope

of seeing things we’d never seen before. Jimi always has a list

of incredible stuff he wants to show us as well. As it happens,

Arp 284 was near the top of my list for that trip’s observing

run. I’d observed it a couple months earlier with my 0.7-

metre (28-inch) scope but failed to discern any hint of its

subtle tidal streams, even though the two galaxies themselves

were easy to see. Tidal effects show the dynamism of galaxy

interactions and are downright awesome to see firsthand.

I thought we had a great shot at seeing them in Arp 284

through the 1.2-m.

16 Pisces and Arp 284

Whatever we point the scope at on a good night will probably

blow us away. Some nights are better than others, of course,

and a few objects hold onto their secrets more tightly than

we’d like, but when the sky co-operates we’re sometimes

surprised in a thrilling way. That’s exactly what happened

while observing the interacting galaxies of Arp 284 (NGC

7714 and NGC 7715).

They’re situated just north of magnitude-5.7 16 Piscium.

This main-sequence F6 star resides in the Milky Way, so its

apparent proximity to Arp 284 is a line-of-sight coincidence:

16 Psc is just 101 light-years away, while Arp 284 is really,

really far in the background at 100 million light-years away.

Because 16 Psc shines so brightly, it needs to be placed

DEEP DISCOVERY by Howard Banich

A story of extragalactic time and distance