Light Polution threat for Qld Astro Fest

[Davelrkn]

Hi All
Today I received and Email from a concerned farmer who lives at Colinton
not far from the Astrofest site.
In his email he states that 13 extra large light posts have been placed on the D'Aguilar Hwy and at the turnoff to Toogoolawah.He has an interest in
Astronomy and has attended Astrofest when he can ,and is concerned of how this will affect this years Astrofest and future ones.

Althought is area is still some distance from Astrofest, I do not feel it will make much difference,but it will be interesting to see if any glow is noticed from the site

Regards
Dave

[h0ughy]

without knowing the area intimately, how far away are the lights? may only show up with fog?

[Dennis]

Hi Houghy

Working from memory, the Astrofest site at Duckadang is approx 13km from Linville, and then Linville is approx 6km from Moore on the D'Aguilar Hwy. Moore is approx 7km from the Toogoolawah turn off.

Therefore, worst case scenario is maybe 20km from the Astrofest, but more probably over 25km?

Cheers

Dennis

[h0ughy]

just at the curvature limit, will be just over the horizon

[Davelrkn]

Houghy
I'm going to Email the farmer to find out exactly where the poles are placed
He said that they were on the D'Aguilar Hwy but not sure where but Colinton is about 5 to 6 klms to Moore on the D'Aguilar Hwy and its at Moore that you tunoff to the Camp Site which is around 20 klms from Moore.Toogoolawah is further south on the Brisbane Valley Hwy further away from the camp

Regards
Dave

[firstlight]

From what I can determine, I think that Dennis is spot on about the distance from Duckadang to the turnoff. Google Earth puts it about 24km as the crow flies.

[Davelrkn]

I have received further info from the farmer
The electric light poles are all together at the intersection of the D'Aguilar Hwy and Brisbane Valley Hwy and were on last night He said that they might not impact as much as first thought

From the intersection to Moore is 14 klms and from Moore to the camp is 20klms a total of 34 klms

At this distance I not feel it being an issue

Regards

Dave

[Zubenel]

hope you got my email dave. it would be good to know if the fixtures were an aeroscreen type( flat glass base, zero above the horizontal). these are the best mechanical option other than specifying low pressure sodium bulbs.and yes i agree that the lights would not be a direct threat to astrofest but each and every light adds to sky glow. zub:(

[firstlight]

34 ks by road Dave... light tends to travel in a straight line, but it is still over 20 k over the hills.

TOny

[CoombellKid]

That's a fair distance, can you still see the highway from up there at Duckadang? the glow from the east south-east would be more impacting (brisbane/coastal).

regards,CS

Rob

[jjjnettie]

I've been watching them putting up those light poles for the last couple weeks. I'd hate to be living within a km of them, thank goodness I've moved, but they won't affect conditions at Duckadang.

[Zubenel]

Good to Know! Did they have the flat glass base on them . eg pointing down with out a diffuser?? :thumbsup:

[jjjnettie]

LOL To be honest, I spent more time dodging the workman and escavators than looking at what sort of lights they were.

[[1ponders]]

Then keep your eyes on the road and not the workmen Jeanette :lol:

[jjjnettie]

But you've got to look at the workmen so you don't run them over.

[[1ponders]]

:lol:

[Sonia]

Astronomers merely asking the authorities to make sure that lights shine down, not up. What will the night sky look like at the end of the presen century? We hear a great deal about light pollution, and it is only too evident that the night sky is not so dark as it used to be only a few years ago. City-dwellers barely see the stars at all,a nd in Britain it is hard to find anywhere so isolated that the sky does appear genuinly black. The problem is not confined to industrial areas. At mount Wilson in California, the great 100-inch Hooker reflector - once the most poweful telescope in the world, used by Edwin Hubble to prove that the spiral nebulae really are external galaxies - was mothballe for a while because the sky had become too bright.
But artifical lights are not the only hazards. Commercial radio transmission are interfering with radio astronomy, adn the problem is increaing all the time. Now attention is being brought to aircraft condensation trails, which can dissipate and become indistinguishable from other clouds.
Finally of course we have global warming which is undoubtedly taking place, whether or not we are the cause is a matter for debate.

To know what to do about thiswe have to look at it all one by one. Books have been written about light pollution. There is a great deal of public support, but also a certain amount of opposition, because some people are fondly under the impression that astronomers want to douse all the lights and plunge us into Stygian blacknes. This is far from true. Astronomers are merely asking the appropriate authorities to make sure that lights shine down, not up. The campaign is having a certain amount of success, but there is a long way to go yet, and wecertainly cant be confident that the skies of 2100 will be an inky as those of 1900.
When it comes to radio pollution, the problems are quite different, and relatively recent.
Next on our lists ar contrails. A vivid warning that a threat to astronomy is very serious indeed, If trends in cheap air travel continue then the era of ground astronomy may become to a halt and end much earlier than most have predicted. Global warming is happening at the end of Maunder minimum, the start of the Medieval maximum, and so on. The burning question is, have we anything to do with it, or is the Sun responsible? By 2100 AD we will all be too busy saving our lives to pay much attention to the sky. But assuming that we are still here and that earth remains a subtle place for us, we may have to accept that the night sky is unpleasantly bright, and there is general deterioration in the seeing conditions.
We could control artificial lights, we could ensure that radio pollution was cut, we could reduce the number of trails by reducing the number of flights. Whether we would actually do any of these things is highly debatable, and in any case we cannot control the sun. Global warming is a fact and though in the opinion of many people it is likely to be followed by compensatory period of global cooling, it is something to be discussed.

So in the long term run there is only one answer, to go to space! The hubble space telescope has shown the way. If all goes well we will have observatories on the mon. From Earth we must continue to do well as we can. But are these dire predictions correct.

[jjjnettie]

Sonia,
When you mentioned contrail pollution, it put me in mind of what happened after 9/11. Most aircraft were grounded for a week, and the skys cleared up.
Here is a link to a very interesting article on Global Dimming and the Greenhouse Effect.

www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/horizon/dimming_trans.shtml

It seems that we are damned if we do and damned if we don't.