Dark Skies Awareness: seeing in the dark

 

The arc of the Milky Way seen from a truly dark site is part of our planet's cultural and natural heritage. It is now more urgent than ever to preserve and protect dark night skies in places such as urban cultural landscapes, national parks and sites connected with astronomical observations, as well as to support the goals of UNESCO's thematic initiative, Astronomy and World Heritage, to preserve sites of astronomical importance for posterity. The ongoing loss of a dark night sky for much of the world's population is a serious and growing issue that not only impacts astronomical research, but also human health, ecology, safety, security, economics and energy conservation. According to the United Nations, around 3.3 billion people, over half of the world's population, live in cities. With the growth of large cities, the number of people living in cities could climb to 5 billion by 2030. As cities grow, so does their impact on the global environment.

For this Cornerstone project the IAU and UNESCO collaborate with the US National Optical Astronomy Observatory, representatives of the International Dark-Sky Association, the Starlight Initiative and other national and international partners in dark-sky and environmental education on several related themes. The focus is on three main citizen-scientist programmes that measure local levels of light pollution. These programmes take the form of "star hunts" or "star counts", providing people with a fun and direct way of acquiring heightened awareness of light pollution through firsthand observations of the night sky. The three programmes cover the entire IYA2009, namely GLOBE at Night (in March), the Great World Wide Star Count (in October) and How Many Stars (January, February, April through September, November and December). During IYA2009, GLOBE at Night set a new record, with 80% more observations of the world's dark skies than the programme's previous best.

 

Official website

UN Millenium Development Goals

  

 

 

      

Project Website

http://www.darkskiesawareness.org/

Task Group
Connie Walker (USA,NOAO) - Chair - cwalker@noao.edu

Beatriz Garcia Argentina beatrizgarciautn@gmail.com
Viviana Bianchi Argentina viviana_bianchi@hotmail.com
Robert Hollow Australia Robert.Hollow@csiro.au
Helen Sim Australia Helen.Sim@csiro.au
Guenther Wuchterl Austria gwuchterl@tls-tautenburg.de
Thomas Posch Austria posch@astro.univie.ac.at
Friedel Pas Belgium europe@darksky.org
Tasso Napoleao Brazil tassonapoleao@ig.com.br
Robert Dick Canada rdick@ccs.carleton.ca
Ken Tapping Canada Ken.Tapping@nrc.gc.ca
Cristian Góez  Colombia crisgote2005@hotmail.com
Pedro Sanhueza Chile psanhueza@opcc.cl
Roger Ferlet France ferlet@iap.fr
Alain Legue France alain.legue@wanadoo.fr
Andreas Haneal Germany Haenel@osnabrueck.de
Rosa Doran GHOU rosa.doran@gmail.com
Margarita Metaxa Greece m-metaxa@otenet.gr
Sze-Leung Cheung Hong Kong csl@hokoon.edu.hk
Kollath Zoltan Hungary kollath@konkoly.hu
Robert Hill Ireland rabhill@hotmail.com
Albert White Ireland albert.white@gmail.com
Fabio Falchi Italy falchi@lightpollution.it
Alessandra Zanazzi Italy zanazzi@cittadellascienza.it
Stefania Varano Italy s.varano@ira.inaf.it
Steve Butler New Zealand s_butler@xtra.co.nz
Maria Luisa Aguilar Hurtado Peru ml_aguilarh@yahoo.es
Julia Romanowska Poland romju57@gmail.com
Tomasz Wierzchowski Poland tomasz.wierzchowski@gmail.com
Dan Hillier Scotland djh@roe.ac.uk
Nikola Bozic Serbia bozicn@gmail.com
Pavol Duris Slovakia pavuk@8mag.net
Andrey Mohar Slovenia darksky@tp-lj.si
Kevin Govender South Africa kg@saao.ac.za
Sivuyile Manxoyl South Africa sivuyile@saao.ac.za
Cipriano Marin Spain cmarin@unescocan.org
Yuki Kaneko Turkey yuki.kaneko@uah.edu
Darren Baskill United Kingdom dbl@star.le.ac.uk
Terry Mann United States starsrus2@earthlink.net
Kim Patten United States kim@darksky.org
Sue Anne Heatherly United States sheatherly@nrao.edu

Advisors

Doug Isbell USA dougisbell@hotmail.com
Malcolm Smith Chile msmith@ctio.noao.edu
Richard Wainscoat United States rjw@IfA.Hawaii.Edu

 

 


Organisational Associates:
ESO AAS INSU CAS STRW NOVA STFC SCNAT SPA NRC MEC CNES DLR ESA JAXA NAOJ APL PS ESF ISRO ICRAN NLSI NOT U Cluster NASAEAS ASI NRAO CEA  KASI EAE SPA AUI CROSCI



The International Year of Astronomy 2009 is endorsed by the United Nations and the International Council of Science.