Monthly Archives: January 2018

Standing Room Only

 in Blog  tagged robotic telescope / sierra remote observatory / SRO

Last week I visited Sierra Remote Observatory (SRO), a telescope hosting service.  What that means is that people install their telescope at SRO and operate them over the internet to capture images.  There are both private (amateur) and professional astronomy operations located here, and it’s very popular, which explains why the other common meaning for “SRO”, standing room only, might apply.  There are 2 large buildings like this that are filled with telescopes, most of them quite large.  There are also smaller buildings, visible on the left in this photo, that house individual telescopes.  There are no available spaces at […]

Looking Back (and Forward)

 in Blog  tagged 2017 / 2018 / events / history / review

One of the greatest things about astronomy is that when we look at very distant objects in the universe we are actually looking back in time.  Because it takes time for light (and other “signals”) to reach us over huge distances, we can literally see what things were like long ago.  Thus, the science of astronomy is largely about history.  The difference between astronomers and historians is that astronomers have to use a lot of tricky extrapolation and inference to learn about the past. I, on the other hand, can tell you about the recent past of Wa-chur-ed Observatory directly […]

Air & Space Photo Contest 1

 in Blog  tagged Air & Space / magazine / Photo contest / Smithsonian

Air & Space Magazine, published by the Smithsonian Institution, has an annual photo contest with 4 categories, including one for astronomy photos.  I submitted 10 images last Fall, including 1 collaborative image done with my friend, Kay Wyatt.  The judges have selected 10 finalists in each category, and I’m pleased to announce that our collaboration and 3 of my own images are among the Astronomy finalists! The judges will eventually choose a winner in each category, plus a Grand Prize winner across all categories.  But there is also a Readers’ Choice award.  You can vote for your favorite image in […]