A call for observations of the famous symbiotic star, one of the brightest, CH cyg has been launched by Margaritta Karovska. This is to support observations planned for the next two weeks in X ray (CHANDRA) and otical/UV (HST) domains.

Observations are gathered on this page by the ARAS group http://www.astrosurf.com/aras/surveys/chcyg/index.html

A run of three weeks of observations is ongoing with my eshell spectrograph and 0.35m LX200 telescope.

I organized my observing session is divide in two parts. First part until midnight Be program, mainly FF cam and another Be, plus one star on other Pro am programs, FS cma object, eps aur or vv cep. Then in the second part I let the telescope follow CH cyg from midnight to 6 am, from 17° elevation to 70° at sunrise, taking 1200s exposures during 6H. Each spectra is the result of three indivdual exposures. This is to thoroughly support observations by the two space telescopes.

Up to date i had 23H exposure, 23 echelle spectra covering 4280 to 7360A. Lines of interest are H beta, [OIII]5008 and H alpha

Example for one night of observation with a transient atmospheric line, visible only at low elevation in the beginning of all the series i took in order 41. Auroral activities was intense these last days and the Chandra observations has to be delayed to end of the week or the beginning of the next week. 

Order 34, around H alpha with variations on the blue part of the H alpha line, maybe a sign of jet.

This is another example of what amateur can do as ground support of important space campaign.

Exciting isn't it ?

Update: time series of 300s exposure on H alpha http://www.astrosurf.com/garrel/webb_CHcyg/Vspec_CH_cyg_300serie.html

Nouvelle campagne 2015