By CLAUDIA HARMON WORTHEN
Beautify Cambria’s Dark Sky Initiative presented another outstanding educational event on Saturday, October 12, at the Santa Rosa Catholic Church. David Breda, lead engineer with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, showed his latest project, the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. With help from an innovative coronagraph instrument, the telescope will send back evidence of mysterious dark matter and data that can lead to discovering life on other planets. A clip from David’s presentation can be seen at: beautifycambria.org/.
Steve Williams, orbital analyst instructor from Vandenberg, shared firsthand information about the thousands of satellites and pieces of space debris in orbit. The number is growing without any governmental oversight. Space travel will become more perilous as thousands, perhaps millions, of objects large and small threaten satellites and even the International Space Station.
Sivani Babu, attorney, award winning nature photographer and CEO of Hidden Compass online magazine, gave a dynamic talk about the negative effects of excessive light at night and the danger to humans and wildlife. Avid Cambria astrophotographer Frank Widmann shared his deep space photos and vast knowledge of stars, nebulae, new and dying stars and more. Attendees got an up-close view of celestial objects through large telescopes and high-powered binoculars shared by Scott McMillan and Dave Majors. The waxing gibbous moon was bright until the Cambria fog obscured the sky. “It was an incredible event and the speakers were interesting. It was phenomenal,” said Diane Pullano of Pasadena. Sixty attendees enjoyed four speakers, a silent auction, telescopes and food from Soto’s, Old Stone Station, and French Corner Bakery.
Thank you to the volunteers who made the event a success: Donna Bower, Scott McMillan, John Scott, Jim Worthen, Lee McFarland, Harry Farmer, and Terri Pilot. Coast High School and Leffingwell High School students Uri Vargas, DeClan Mackenzie, Jesus Sanchez, and Dotty Humphrey from Leffingwell High School, took charge of setting up food and merchandise. It was impressive to see these young people take the initiative to create artistic and functional displays.
Beautify Cambria is grateful to the local businesses and individuals who donated auction gifts including Home Arts, Verde of Cambria, Madeline’s, Sow’s Ear, Froggies, Cayucos Cellar, Best Kept Secret, The Garden Shed, Ocean Heir, Scott McMillan, and Frank Widmann. The profits from the event will be used to further the effort to certify Cambria as a Dark Sky Community codified by Dark Sky International.
The next dark sky event will be Sidewalk Astronomy on Saturday, January 25, at the Cambria Historical Museum. Details to be announced in the future.
Sky photo by Frank Widman and Ice photo by Sivani Babu.
