A Hubble Story

Is the subject of this month’s Estes Valley Astronomical Society (EVAS) meeting.   EVAS in conjunction with The Estes Park Memorial Observatory is offering a free public lecture on Saturday, September 22nd, 2018 at the Estes Park High School Audiatorium..  The goal of EVAS is to promote amateur astronomy and education in the Estes valley.

Our speaker will be Dr John M. Grunsfeld an astronaut and scientist with extensive experience as a leader in space and science missions and national space policy.  He has served as a NASA astronaut, Associate Administrator, NASA Chief Scientist and deputy director of the Space Telescope Science Institute, managing the science program for the Hubble Space Telescope and the forthcoming James Webb Space Telescope. Grunsfeld is a veteran of five Space Shuttle flights and eight spacewalks including to the Hubble Space Telescope, and Russian space station Mir. His research is in the field of exoplanet studies and the search for life in the Universe. 

The Hubble Space Telescope story has been a fascinating study in public policy, engineering, ethics, and science. The Hubble is perhaps the most productive scientific instrument ever created by humans.  In May 2009, a team of astronauts flew to the Hubble Space Telescope on space shuttle Atlantis. On their 13-day mission and over the course of 5 spacewalks they completed an extreme makeover of the orbiting observatory.

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They installed the Wide Field Camera-3, the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph, repaired the Advanced Camera for Surveys and the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph, as well as a number of maintenance activities. These Hubble spacewalks are considered the most challenging and daring efforts ever of people working in space.  Now, still going strong on orbit, the Hubble has a full complement of instruments capable of performing state-of-the-art observations from the near infra-red to the ultraviolet end of the spectrum. Scientific results from the repaired instruments hint at a bright scientific future for Hubble and will be presented in the talk as well as a narrative of the adventures on orbit.

Because of the expected crowd, this month’s open house will be held in the auditorium of the Estes Park High School and Not at the observatory. The high school is at 1600 Manford Ave. The doors will open at 7:00 pm and the meeting will start at 7:30 pm.  The presentation, including a question and answer period, lasts about an hour.  Information about the meeting can be found on the observatory website at: www.AngelsAbove.Org or calling the observatory at 970-586-5668.

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