Shannonside Astronomy Club Public Star Party for GAM Limerick Ireland

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Apr 19

2010

by Dierdre Kelleghan

All I can say is WOW, what a night!
We had prestine clear skies here in Limerick, some people asked if the volcanic dust from the Icelandic volcano would be a problem when infact it has actually helped us due to the complete absence of any contrails in the sky, and not a cloud in sight.!!
Over the entire night we must have had over 150 people come along to the event with well over 100 there at one stage!!!

Shannonside Astronomy Club Star Party for GAM by David Lillis and Frank Ryan Junior

This was an amazing turn out and shows what some proper advertising can do for us. We started out at 8.30 and everyone there had views of the thin cresent Moon through the clubs 12" Dob and Venus through clubs 10" Meade SCT.
The views were steady and everyone was happy.
Later on as the Moon set, we set the 2 telescopes on Saturn and again everyone got fantastic views of Saturn and its moons Titan, Tethys and Rhea, the rings were very nice also. Later we swung the scopes over to Mars and despite its small size and it been past its best, everyone got enjoyable view of it. Some people brought along their own scopes and we helped them in setting them up and how to use them.
By 11.30 people were starting to melt away and we finished up at midnight.

Our riverside location with the newly refurbished riverside walkway with seating, railings and bins is definitely working to our advantage despite the lighting and a few trees. I think everyone attending got a great views of the planets and Moon, its an event we're definitely going to run again!
Many thanks to all in SAC who made this event possible!
For more information see.
http://www.shannonsideastronomyclub.com/ and on facebook

We had handouts all about GAM and the what the sidewalk astronomy event was all about (which we ran out of quickly) along with GAM / IFAS stickers and cards. We contacted all the schools in Clare, Limerick and Tipperary along with the Colleges and a great number of the attendees were kids with thier parents.
I'm not joking when I say we at one stage needed croud controll! There were so many people around the scopes that it was hard to move. The queue was half an hour long from end to getting to the scope and some re queued to get a second and third look.
Thanks has to go to everyone on the committee that pitched in along with some club members bringing thier own scopes. We'd also like to officially wish John O Mahony a bon voyage and happy life down under and many thanks for his donations of gear & books to the club. It would be fantastic to see GAM becoming more engrained into the astronomy calander year and having Global Astronomy Month every year!