60th Anniversary Year
Well you definitely cant have too many Christmas parties and with a number of members missing out on the lecture a week before another event was organised. With plenty of food, the Chairman entertaining us with a collection of office jokes and Dave Howes heating up countless bottles of mulled wine, the evening was a nice finish to the year.
Instead of doing a Christmas quiz this year it was decided to have a members lecture with David Bryant, the supplier of comets and meteors at our John Innes Conference. David gave a extremely interesting talk about meteor and comet impacts on earth and how they would effect our whole existence. After the lecture he had his comets and meteors, again on display which a number of members purchased.
The day was attended by about 110 people which was lower than we were hoping but for those who participated it was another very enjoyable event with 5 excellent speakers. During the refreshment breaks the visitors got to see an arrangement of telescopes and displays brought by the members and a chance to buy meteors, comets and space memorabilia. The only one downside to the day was the lunch which was disappointing but with Dr Robin Catchpole starting the day off with a very informative talk and Dr David Whitehouse giving a enlightening last lecture, this event it definitely something we will be doing again in the future.
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This is another milestone in Astronomy for a year with the Annual trip to Kelling Heath for a always very successful observing week. The NAS had a stand down there on the saturday to mark our 60th but with all that astrogear we had to take turns to see what was on offer. I stayed down there for 10 days this year and this has been my longest so far. It was also very good to see more of the members from the NAS making an effort to go down, considering its on the doorstep. With plenty of stalls of astrogear and catching up with like minded people from throughout the country. Just an excellent event.
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This was attended by about 50 members and was very successful indeed. The afternoon was filled with a wide range of short talks from imaging the Sun to light pollution. A very enjoyable afternoon, if not intense. This was followed by a most delicious Hog roast which only took about half an hour for the poor old hog to become a distant memory. After relaxing for a while, our guest speaker, Nik Syzmanek fascinated us all with details of his PPARC funded trip to Hawaii to help publicise the work of the UK telescopes based there which finished off the event.
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The event proved to be extremely popular with over a thousand visitors having a look round the exhibition. With moon rock and a mobile planetarium from the Inspire centre and 9 new members it was an extremely successful event as well.
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We have now acquired another rather interesting looking 10" telescope that will be excellent for planetary viewing. It has a unique design that allows the eyepiece to be fixed in one location. This at the moment has been sited on one of the pads but during next year it will be permanently mounted on a dedicated pad. Group photo with telescope in background below
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Unfortunately after many years excellent service editing of the Societies Cygnus Newsletter, Mark Humpheys has decided to step down from the role. He is able to do the next edition but as of the Spring of 2006 a new editor is needed from the societies membership. If you feel like giving it a go and continue the fine work that Mark has started please let one of the committee members know.
In collaboration with Norfolk Amateur Radio Club a ‘Special Event Station’ was setup for the weekend at Seething Observatory. With a call sign of GB6NAS radio amateurs around the World were calling in to Seething Observatory to talk to members. Here is the report from the Chairman of the radio club:
The special event station celebrating the 60 th anniversary of the Norwich Astronomical Society was run by members of the Norfolk Amateur Radio Club over the 24 th, 25 th and 26 th June 2005. This was without doubt the most successful event of the year so far for me, with such a large turnout of members being so helpful in setting up, operating and closing down the station. Some of the more significant events of the weekend were; 332 total contacts of which 75 were on 2M, the Lowestoft ATV repeater was received (but not unfortunately accessed) on 23cms, the longest distance worked was 7,016 Miles to central Argentina by Simon G7SOZ, the ISS digipeter was copied on both it’s passes and on the morning of the Sunday Contact was made with the Chairman of the Ayrshire Astronomical Society (GM4DLG) by our President Peter G3ASQ who managed to get the Chairman of the NAS (Mark) to pass a greetings message, we were privileged to hear our Chairman, David G7URP on 40M SSB!!!!(Congratulations David). We were also lucky enough to get an aerial photograph of the station taken by one of the NAS members who was kindly taken up by a member from the Seething Aero Club.
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Helen Lawrik-Thompson has decided to stand down from the role of Membership Secretary. In the years in the role she has made great progress in enhancing the membership processes. I'm sure I can speak for you all when I thank her for all her hard work and dedication. It has been very much appreciated.
Valiantly volunteering to temporarily take on the role until the next AGM when the role will be official filled is none other than Sue Napper. Sue is a regular attendee to the Society and I am sure many of you will know her. She is looking forward to getting stuck into the role. Again, on your behalf, I wish her well in the role and thank her for stepping in.
The first of the official 60 th Anniversary events took place on Friday 13 th May with the Society’s very own Dr Dave Clements talking to us about the current popular view of the Universe and then how a growing band of mainstream scientists are starting to question that view. Some fascinating and tantalizing issues were discussed which might make things like teleportation, free energy and time travel the stuff of science fact rather than fiction.
Cast your mind back to the Celestial Festival last summer. You will remember that it was an event organized by South Norfolk Council to celebrate the beauty of the Norfolk night sky. We opened our doors to the public on a number of evenings but did not just have the usual run of the mill event. During each evening we were host to artist Barry Mason who was gaining insight and inspiration from our activities to produce a sculpture to be sighted at Bramerton, Norfolk.
After almost a year of work, and wrangling with the local parish council, Barry was able to unveil the sculpture on 28 th April. Myself, Dave Balcombe and Pete Napper were invited but they were unable to attend. It is an interesting and intriguing piece of artwork that was inspired by a planisphere. A plaque is to be installed recording our participation in the event.
If you get the chance, take a trip down to Bramerton to have a look at it, it is well worth a visit. Find the Bramerton Woods End Pub and continue past it with the river on your left. The road turns sharp right but the river carries on. You will have to continue on foot, but not much more than 100 meters as you will see the sculpture on the right in a sheltered area surrounded by trees.
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| The Sculpture, Artist and Mark Lawrik-Thompson | The view looking skyward underneath the Sculpture. |
The last open night of the winter season saw a great turn out from the public. The fortuitous timing coincided with the new BBC Dr.Who series which helped encourage media interest in the event. To help bring a futuristic feel to the evening a Tardis was borrowed from the Norwich Theatre Royal. Interestingly it was more of a challenge than you’d think transporting it 10 miles when its a machine that can travel through Time and Space!
Our Chairman, Mark Lawrik-Thompson FRAS gave a fascinating insight into the possibilities of time travel, at least in theory if not in practice. The tantalizing possibility of real time travel to any point in the past or future raised many interesting questions and proved thought provoking for those who attended.
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| Tardis and Aliens, I mean Mark Lawrik-Thompson arrives. | |
The clouds as usual were a problem but persistence, a bit of maintenance of a few of the telescopes, to pass the time and plenty of cups of tea later, at around 9pm there was the first breaks in the cloud. Though after rushing out and setting up it clouded over again, it didn't last long and altogether over the night we got around 3 to 4 hours of clear skies. Most of us got to see around 30 to 40 Messier objects. Was definitely worth it.
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