100 Hours of Remote Astronomy

100 Hours of Remote AstronomyTerry Bridges (100 Hours),

Gianluca Masi (Bellatrix Observatory), Mike Simmons (100 Hours)

What was it?• Seven remote observatories generously gave free time on their facilities to the public during 100 Hours:• Bareket Observatory (Israel)• Bellatrix Observatory (Italy)• Cherry Mountain Observatory (Texas, USA)• GRAS (New Mexico, USA and South Australia) • LightBuckets (New Mexico and West Australia)• MicroObservatory (Arizona and Mass, USA)• MyTelescope.com (Eastern Canada)

Some Numbers …• ~2000 people took part directly (controlling telescope or requesting images)• 40,000 – 50,000 people took part indirectly (passive users, site visitors)• Very global: ~100 countries from every part of the world • Thousands of images taken (see later)• Represents tens of thousands of dollars• Huge success!!!

Bareket Observatory in Action!

Horsehead Nebula (Bareket)

M16 (Eagle Nebula) (Bareket)

Saturn (Bellatrix)

M13 (Bellatrix)

Horsehead + Flame Nebulae (Cherry Mountain)

M83 (LightBuckets)

NGC 3372 (MicroObservatory)

NGC 5128 (MicroObservatory)

User Feedback• almost always very positive• “To be given the opportunity to use these fine instruments on such beautiful objects is a great privilege.”• “What you have done, I believe, has been truly significant and historic. You helped bring people worldwide together and have shown them the beauty of the universe.”• “Thank you! This is an amazing program, and my 6-year old may be a future astronomer!!”• “I just requested my own picture of the Orion Nebula! Super-cool!”

Things to Improve• If we’d started earlier, we could have got more observatories involved• Our original goal was to have a central website, but time didn’t permit that• Problems encountered: weather, mixup with dates/times, network/connection issues, timeslots filling up• We hope to run a similar program during Galilean Nights through AWB, focussed on education