Cumbrian Sky

Last night's meeting of the Eddington Astrononomical Society - Kendal's astronomical society, which was named after Sir Arthur Eddington, the famous astronomer who was born in the town - was a huge success, with more than 30 people, members and guests, gathering at Kendal Museum to hear a special lecture by Doug Ellison, the founder of the renowned and respected unmannedspaceflight.com forum.

Doug very kindly travelled up from his home in Leicester to talk to us, so it was great to see so many people at the meeting on such a hot and sunny evening - when the temptation must have been to soak up as much sunshine as possible and not descend the steps down into the heart of the museum to listen to a talk about Mars! - but I'm sure that everyone who came along was happy they made the right decision, because Doug gave a presentation that was slick, funny and entertaining, and packed to bursting with fascinating information.

The meeting began with EAS Chairman, Ken Hough, greeting and thanking everyone for coming, giving a brief biog of Doug, and then inviting EAS Secretary Stuart Atkinson to give the monthly "News Notes". Usually these 'notes' are very comprehensive, covering just about every astronomy- and spaceflight-related news story from the previous month in considerable detail, and can last half an hour or more, but this month (to the obvious disbelief and incredulity of many EAS members!) Stuart promised to keep the notes 'brief'. But, showing amazing self restraint, Stuart did indeed manage to keep his news notes to just 15 mins, and in that time managed to cover the latest news and images from the Mars rovers and the Hubble Space Telescope, look ahead to the landing of Phoenix on Mars on May 25th, and also speculate about just what long-awaited "discovery" NASA will be announcing on Wednesday evening...

With the news notes completed it was time for Doug Ellison to take the floor, and give his much anticipated presentation. This was Doug's second talk to EAS - he visited us last year when he gave a hugely enjoyable talk, describing the many and various mishaps (both unavoidable and avoidable!) that had happened during missions to Jupiter, Mars, Saturn and other planets - so it was no surprise that there was such a good turnout for his return visit.

For his second visit to Kendal, Doug - who not only runs one of the busiest and most respected online space enthusiast groups on the whole of the internet inunmannedspaceflight.com, but lectures on space and space technology around the country and reports from space conferences and seminars for The Planetary Society too - talked to us first about how different spaceprobes have taken pictures of Mars with different cameras and camera systems over the years, and then moved on to give a guide to the Phoenix mission and describe what it hopes to achieve when it lands on Mars in now under a fortnight's time.

Illustrating his talk with dozens of images - some familiar, some never seen by EAS members before, but all fascinating - Doug took his audience on a trip through time, explaining and showing how our view of Mars has changed, and evolved, as each new probe has arrived at the Red Planet, bringing a fancy new camera with it. From the early mega-basic-camera days of Viking, to the very latest wonders revealed by MRO's "spy satellite" HiRISE camera, Doug showed everyone how our understanding of Mars has been revolutionised, again and again, over the past few decades, and over the course of 45 mins the audience saw Mars through Viking's eyes, with images of patches of frost lingering in the shadows of the rocks at Chryse and Utopia Planitia, and through HiRISE's incredible Big Eye, which can see rocks and features on the surface of Mars smaller than 30cm wide, and every mission inbetween...

After a much-needed and much-deserved break (which wasn't really much of a break, to be honest, as he was kept busy talking to interested EAS members!) Doug described the epic missions of the twin Mars Exploration Rovers, showcasing some truly stunning panoramic images, and showing some breathtaking 3D images - which the audience were able to see in 3D with the 3D glasses Doug gave out for them to use - before closing his talk with a detailed look at the mission of the Phoenix probe, that will land on Mars on May 25th. At the end of that part of his presentation no-one in the audience was left in any doubt that Phoenix is a truly significant mission, with fantastic hardware and remarkably sophisticated and ambitious scientific instruments, and I'm sure that if everything goes to plan many more EAS members will now be following the mission a lot more closely in the days that follow the landing. 

The applause that Doug received at the end of his talk was very well deserved, and even though we were running late he took time to answer a few questionsbefore our Chairman, reluctantly, brought the meeting to a close.

All in all it was a superb night, and everyone in EAS would like to thank Doug for travelling up to see us at our home at Kendal Museum. We're already looking forward to a third visit from Doug next year!

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