Restart of "Austrian-Amateur-Astronomer Meeting" at the biggest public observatory of Austria

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Oct 20

2019

by Johannes Stübler

This weekend we restarted an old Austrian tradition. The so called "Austrian Amateur Astronomer Meeting", which was running for decades and was stopped about 15 years ago, had it's revival. The location was well chosen. The biggest Austrian public observatory "VEGA" formed the framework for this event. This observatory was opened last year and is situated near the city of Salzburg. It is equipped with modern presentation and multimedia techniques. The centerpiece is a 1 meter reflector telescope from ASA -Astro Systeme Austria.

The revival of this traditional meeting was initiated by ÖAV - Österreichischer Astronomischer Verein.

The main topic of this event was "Lightpollution" and "Visual Observations". The meeting was a big success and a good starting shot for followup-meetings during the next years in the old tradition.

The centerpiece of the observatory: The 1 meter Ritchey-Chrétien-Cassegrain-Telescope with 7 meter focal length

The main focus was on Lightpollution and on visual observations.

Of course, besides many other Austrian astronomical associations, Kepler Sternwarte Linz was on board :-)

Also some professional astronomers gave us valuable insights in their fields of activity.

Obviously during this event there was place and time to present the newest, very impressive, Deep-Sky results using the 1 m reflector by the local astrophotographer's group.

At the end of this meeting I presented a preview of the next meeting in 2020 which our association will run in Linz at Ars Electronica Center. The working title is: "Skies in motion - from astrolabes to variable stars". A big thematic range with some international partners & guests.

Best regards

Joe

Here I am at the old restored telescope, presented during this event, which was the first telescope of our association - bought in 1948.

 
An old picture of that time, showing our first president and our first telescope.