A girl safely views the sun through a solar telescope at RFO. [Photos courtesy RFO]
attendees in stargazing through the three telescopes. Star Parties have hosted as many as 300 stargazers in a single evening and feature ongoing classroom presentations on a variety of astronomy topics prior to viewings. The 20- to 30-minute classroom presentations offer a choice of several topics—black holes, exoplanets, Big Bang, dark matter/ dark energy, the Mars rovers, James Webb Space Telescope, the sun, neutron stars and the Fermi Paradox (named for Italian-American physicist Enrico Fermi, who pointed out the contradiction between the high probability of advanced extraterrestrial civilizations and the lack of evidence to support it). Recently, docent Sam Cena took a poll of those in attendance: “Who would like to hear about black holes?” A few hands went up. “How about neutron stars?” A few more hands were raised. The majority voted for exoplanets, or planets that orbit stars outside our solar system. Sergei and Irina Graff of Los Gatos and their 8-year-old daughter were among those attending. “I was hoping to hear the presentation on the Fermi Paradox. Are there really aliens out there?” she pondered. “Guess I’ll have to come back to find out.” On their way out the family stopped at the RFO store and purchased a telescope. On Monday, April 12 approximately 200 gathered at RFO in anticipation of the solar eclipse. In the classroom viewers watched NASA’s live streaming as the eclipse made its way across the country. Three telescopes set up outdoors offered views of the partial eclipse over Sonoma County. When the total blackout made landfall at Mazatlán, Mexico the crowd cheered. “Amazing!” “Cool!” “Wow!” could be heard throughout the room. And when a flare erupted from the sun’s corona, everyone gasped. Jacopo Soraiano lifted his young daughter up to peer though the telescope. “My wife and I came up from San Francisco with our two daughters for a few days camping at Sugarloaf—our timing was perfect,” he said. “This is so
The 40-inch reflecting telescope in the west wing only uses red light at night to protects viewers’ vision. [Photo courtesy RFO]
May 2024
NorthBaybiz 27
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