Contest Entry: Mauna Kea
[This entry is from Andrew Cooper from, according to his email, The Keck Observatory.]
A dark sky, a group of curious tourists and a green laser. All you need to truly need to have a great astronomical experience.
Where do all these things come together? High on the slopes of the world’s tallest mountain, a place called Mauna Kea. Every night the staff and volunteers of the Mauna Kea Visitor Information Center roll out the telescopes and present the sky to anyone who comes. Unlike so many other tourist events in Hawai’i that will give you a good time for a price, this experience is free for anyone who makes the trip up the road to the visitor center at the 9,200ft level on the south face of the mountain. This is where I can be found every other Friday, green laser in hand, standing beside the telescope.
Mauna Kea offers something that so many visitors from the mainland rarely get to see, a completely dark sky. This is the sky we all knew before humanity began banishing the night from our homes and cities with electric lights. I have talked with children who have never seen a sky with so many stars. Their reactions are priceless and very informative, a child who thinks a normal sky has only a few dozen stars. This is why I volunteer my time up on the mountain, talking to that child made my whole evening worthwhile.
I start my talk with a description of why Mauna Kea is a great place for astronomy. How do you convince them of that idea? Simply show them two comets, three galaxies, a nebula and a handful of open clusters in the matter of a few minutes… without a telescope, or binoculars, or any other optical aid, simply the basic human eye. We have been lucky over the last month to have two comets available to the naked eye. Even without comets the dark sky will often provide something special; a row of bright planets, a few good meteors, bright zodiacal light or simply the softly glowing arc of the Milky Way high overhead. This is all you need to help connect your audience with the universe beyond our little planet. You just need something that makes sense, a little eureka moment of understanding and suddenly the sky is not remote and unknowable. A little explanation and the fear of the mysterious becomes the comfort of the familiar.
It is this fear of the unknown that has through history driven so many into the arms of superstition and pseudoscience. Any explanation is better than not knowing as long as that explanation just seems right, or has some perception of authority behind it. We want to know the answer, it is a basic human drive, but in the absence of knowledge we just make something up.
It is imperative that those of us who strive to see past the superstitions do our best to show our fellow citizens of Earth that the truth is nothing to be feared, we can all see the universe for what it is. It may be vast beyond understanding, older than we can truly comprehend, the scales, facts and numbers so large that they make little sense to our everyday lives. But this does not mean we can not learn about the cosmos, that with knowledge and understanding a dark starry sky can be something known and familiar, something to be treasured and enjoyed whenever possible.
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1 opinion for Contest Entry: Mauna Kea
Diann Nicolai
Jan 21, 2008 at 8:50 am
Andrew, I have read and reread your entry. It truly touches the soul of astronomy. As a teacher and prior resident of the islands, I can perfectly picture your perfect picture. Sadly, I never made it to Mauna Kea - but after this reading, it is definitely on my To Do list. Shaka!
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