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Since ancient times, the night sky has been a source of wonder, fascinating people with its infinite possibilities. Today, with space missions active in every corner of our solar system, we're getting to know our planetary neighbours in a way that our ancestors could only dream of. If you have any astro-nuts or stargazers in your house, you can help them track space missions and guide them through the starry night skies with some of the web's stellar astronomy sites.
For beginner space enthusiasts, printing out star maps is a great starting point. You can find printable guides to each month's celestial highlights at Astronomy for Kids. Their Sky Maps plot out where constellations and planets can be seen, along with any unique events, such as the annual Perseid meteor shower that dazzled us in August.
"Once you're ready to do some observing, check out Clear Sky Clock, a Canadian invention," says science journalist Ivan Semeniuk of the Discovery Channel. "The Clock takes Environment Canada weather data and turns it into a prediction for viewing conditions across North America — wonderful for anyone contemplating a night out with binoculars."
Join star parties and clubs
For more in-depth stargazing, hook up with a local Royal Astronomy Society of Canada astronomy club or attend a local star party. Mark Oldfield organizes the Great Manitou Star Party held annually in August on Manitoulin Island in the northern area of Lake Huron. "It's become a huge outdoor festival with music and other activities scheduled throughout the weekend, but the real draw is being able to look at the night sky through powerful telescopes and learn directly from more experienced stargazers," says Oldfield.
Two online sites to find local astronomy club listings as well as in-depth articles on astronomy are Sky News magazine, a Canadian publication, and Sky & Telescope. The latter's Interactive Sky Charts are customizable for any location in the world and its primer Your First Steps in Astronomy is essential reading for beginners.
Track space missions online
Once the weather cools, move your stargazing indoors and explore the web's stellar astronomy sites. Start out at NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day, where images of phenomena like the Cat's Eye nebula or a close-up of Mars can be found. Other eye-popping visuals can be found at the Hubble telescope site, where high-resolution photos of every space object imaginable are posted regularly, along with a selection of attention-grabbing wallpaper.
But the mother of all space websites has to be NASA's award-winning portal, which is surprisingly easy to navigate despite its size. Divided into four main areas — Missions, Multimedia, News & Events and Popular Topics — the site is the first place where Semeniuk goes, whenever he's tracking one of the agency's many missions. "You could spend weeks seeing everything on the NASA site, but it's remarkably well-organized and efficient," he says.
The hottest draw for NASA in recent months has been the Mars Exploration Rover Mission. With Mars now considered one of the best places in the solar system where there's a possibility of finding traces of life, the search was on for signs of water. Two months after the rovers Spirit and Opportunity arrived on Mars in January 2004, Opportunity found evidence that its landing site had once been the shoreline of a great big salty sea. Mission accomplished! If you missed all the hubbub, check out the PBS Nova series online for great background information on the Rover mission.
Observe rings of fire
Fans of Saturn's beautiful rings can check out NASA's most ambitious mission at the Cassini- Huygens site. In December, watch for Cassini and Huygens to separate, with the Huygens probe scheduled to land on Titan, one of Saturn's moons in January. NASA's Kids Space puts the mission into context for pint-sized planet enthusiasts, and helps kids locate Saturn in the night sky simply by entering their nearest city.
Blowin' in the solar wind
Suzanne Taylor, an astronomer at the Ontario Science Centre, is monitoring the Genesis mission, which recently sent solar wind samples down to Earth in a specially designed capsule that unfortunately fell to a crash landing in the Utah desert after its parachute failed to open. "Solar wind contains charged particles — the same thing that causes our Northern Lights," explains Taylor. "We hope something can be salvaged. If so, these samples should kick-start new research into how the solar system was formed." As with most NASA missions, a kids' site devoted to Genesis exists. But for more general news on space exploration, Taylor recommends two sites especially for children — NASA'S StarChild and Imagine the Universe. "Starchild has two levels: one a very good introduction to astronomy, and the second more advanced. And Imagine the Universe allows older kids to pose questions directly to real NASA scientists."
Published October 2004
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Writer, Ilona Biro
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