Australian Sky & Telescope — January 01, 2018

THE ASTRONOMY SCENE

56 Cosmic relief
A solar eclipse is a chance to spread
the wonder of astronomy.
By David Grinspoon

66 Test report
We road-test Celestron’s highly
versatile CGX equatorial mount.
By Dennis di Cicco

72 Astronomer’s workbench
A remarkable hi-tech telescope.
By Jerry Oltion

74 NightLife and Astro Calendar
Events and activities for astro
enthusiasts.

76 Gallery
Latest images from our readers.

80 Marketplace

81 Indextoadvertisers

82 Focal Point
Major astronomy projects need
community support if they’re to
succeed.
By Govert Schilling

ON THE COVER

An international flotilla of spacecraft will
soon set sail for the Red Planet, hoping
to find evidence of past or present life.
See page 16.

P.72 Two telescopes in one

AFTER DECADES OF DELAY and lack of interest, the federal government

has finally bitten the bullet and committed to establishing an Australian

national space agency equivalent to NASA or ESA. It’s great news, but it

has to be said that we haven’t yet seen the detail of what the new agency

will do, how it will work with and complement existing scientific and

engineering bodies, how much funding it will be given, and so on.

There had been previous attempts with quasi-agencies in the past — the

CSIRO Office of Space Science and Applications in the 1980s, and the

Australian Space Office in the 1990s — with CSIRO ending up being our

de-facto space agency for many years. Yet I’ve lost track of the number

of studies, enquiries and reports over the past 30-plus years that have

recommended the establishment of a proper national agency. I and many

others have been banging on about the need for one for years now. And

I had more or less given up hope that the day would ever come, so it was

rather pleasing to hear the good news announced (see page 14).

While Australia will likely never get into the business of launching large

rockets from its home soil, there are nonetheless lots of profitable and

productive niches in space science, exploration and technology that can be

exploited. Here’s hoping the reality will live up to the promise.

Australia, ready

for lift-off

Jonathan Nally,Editor

[email protected]

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