Scouting for ISAN v.2 location

Columbus Circle, New York City.

Given its location and the amount of ambient light it is not all that bad for a northeastern to southeastern exposure. Central Park, the foreground when looking opposite this view, is favorable to a low horizon across that eastern view. Saturn and the Moon were unaffected by bright lights. Naked eye limiting magnitude is somewhere between 2.5 and 3.0. The killer is the subway beneath and perhaps all the street traffic that cause a great amount of scope shimmer and shake. For that very reason I'll abandon this spot for the second annual International Sidewalk Astronomy Night on 12 April 2008.

2nd Annual ISAN & Yuri's Night

ISAN logo

12 April 2008 is the 2nd Annual International Sidewalk Astronomy Night (ISAN), same day as Yuri's Night. Two celebrations, one for astronomy, another for manned space program.

19 May 2007 was last year's date but we were rained out here. The following day it cleared enough where a few groups set up around the city to hold the first annual International Sidewalk Astronomy Night from Central Park.

I haven't decided where I'll be this year. I'll coordinate with others,especially folks from AAA of NYC I may return to the south side of the Great Lawn but am considering a higher traffic area with good exposure from south to west. Moon, Mars, and Saturn will no doubt be the highlights. I'll post updates in the future.


Snipped from Yuri's Night '08
12 April 1961 marks mankind's first flight into space with Soviet cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin. 20 years later to the date the Space Shuttle was launched on her maiden flight, STS-1.

I attended the party at CUNY Graduate Center where Greg Olsen shared his experience with training and flight with the Russians to the ISS. I really enjoyed his presentation. Other speakers included astronaut Tom Henricks and mathematician Dr. Edward Belbruno. After the event, I picked up an autographed book from Ed Belbruno, Fly Me to the Moon.

Eclipse handout

Click and then print larger image. Folding instructions below or at PocketMod.

For the recent total lunar eclipse, I prepared a handout for the pedestrians. The objective was to provide information listed below, space availability was the governing factor. Not everything made it or was to be trimmed down to fit space.

The handout consisted of:
- brief description & time table of the event
- Danjon Brightness Scale to describe color and brightness vaules
- basic moon map (using NASA Lunar Landing Map)
- illustration of moon's passage through shadows (Espenak's)
- list of NYC astronomy groups
- a list of astronomy resources in NYC

I relied on freely available material, particularly Fred Espenak's work available on the NASA web site. I did model my black and white version based Fred Espenak's illustration for easier reading in dimmer lighting. In fact, I made few a drawings, one which showed the geometry of an eclipse and the "phases" (shape) of the moon as the event unfolded. Those images are forever stuck in a corrupted file on a USB stick :{ a lesson learned the hard way } and I had no time to make them up. Instead I whipped up a version similar to this one.

I realize there is much room for improvement but I like the start and like its utility. Better planning and considering both sides of the paper will improve the design and effectiveness of future handouts. I find it too easy to provide too much detail and just as hard to distill to the essential elements while keeping it engaging. Also, copy should not really be dense, pictures being a thousand words augment what I might be explaining.

I am working on a boilerplate to adapt to regular sidewalk sessions. I am even looking to standardize on a form that can be used by sidewalk astronomers for 2nd Annual International Sidewalk Astronomy Night (ISAN).

Folding
(Will follow up with my own illustrated directions.)
On a recent trip, my daughter returned with an origami book and folding paper for omiage (gift giving/souvenier). I have been hooked on paper folding since and thought of applying it to the handout. Via my Moleskine interest and paper pdas, PocketMod came to mind. I chose this attractive and convenient paper book format for 8 usable pages per side of a folded sheet. When you get the knack, this fold can be done in seconds. In the simplest of descriptions a piece of paper is:
- folded in half along each axis: length and width
- unfolded and then re-folded the length of the paper
- fold each half, making quarters across the length of the page
- with printed side up, sharpen the fold across the width
- tear the lengthwise fold, center of the sharpened width
- lay the torns sides flat
- fold the paper along the length
- flatten and square up booklet

Comes with two accessible pockets to tuck other notes away.


Links
Lunar Landing Map

21 February 2008 Eclipse Predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA's GSFC

PocketMod
A pop-up window with paper folding instructions from this page. Beneath Step #2 and to the right of Step#4, click the "Folding Guide" button.