Latest / Space Nuts: Astronomy Insights & Cosmic Discoveries / #441: The Return of Phosphine & Space Debris Dilemmas

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#441: The Return of Phosphine & Space Debris Dilemmas · Space Nuts: Astronomy Insights & Cosmic Discoveries

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hi there, Thanks for joining us yet again on yet
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: another episode of the yet to be heard Space Nuts.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: My name is Andrew Uncle, your host, and it's good
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: to have your company coming up on this episode. We
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: talked about it before it was rebuked, debunked, and the
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: door was shut on it, and that was life in
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: the atmosphere of Venus, and we only spoke about it
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: the other day, and yet again it has made the news.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: We will tell you all about it. We're also going
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: to look at some movement on the issue of space debris.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: You might remember there were a couple of incidents recently
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: recently with houses hit and people pumped and all sorts
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: of because of space junk. Well, it looks like they're
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: going to literally move on that issue. And we're going
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: to talk about a man that Fred has worked with
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: in the past, a man who had a wonderful astronomy
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: career has recently passed, but a real advocate for dark skies,
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: David L. Crawford. That's all coming up on this edition
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: of Space Nuts.
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: Fifteen second in Channel ten nine ignition sequence Space Nuts
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: or three two.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: One Space Notes as when I reported Neils Good and
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: making his moves in this episode will be Professor Fred Watson.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: Hello.
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: Yes, everything in the universe moves, so I might as
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: well move as.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: Well, which is good. You too, You too. I just
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: got back from Sydney. I didn't have time to rush
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: over to your side of the city. Would have taken
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: away too long. Do Yeah, I would love to, but
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: we were moving our son into a new apartment and
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: yeah it was Yeah, he's very happy. It's a lovely place.
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: It's a very nice suburbs. It's off a main road.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: In fact, it's nowhere near a main road, so it's
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: really quiet. He's done well. I'm very proud of him,
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: and we both are. And it all went well until
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: I stubbed my toe on a concrete step and I
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: just hit it at the perfect angle to cause mayhem
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: and destruction. So ended up in a doctor's surgery and
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: had to have Yes, the pressure relieved by drilling a
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: needle through the top of the nail. I don't recommend it.
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: Did you get any kind of local anesthetic for that
• 2:29
  Speaker 3: or no?
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: He just we Actually it was funny because we were
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: having a really long conversation while he was doing it.
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: I think it was more for me to keep his
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: mind off it than mine because I didn't really care.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: I've had so many needles stuck in me over my life.
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: Just another one, I must I must say he was
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: very good. It didn't didn't hurt at all that there
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: was already a lot of pain there, so maybe it
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: did notice. But yeah, I just completely yeah, just have
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: been the perfect angle to cause the damage because I'd
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: choose on. But still I won't show it to you.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: You don't look you. It's very kind of you. Sounds
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: like it's that color.
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: Oh gosh, yes, a freak accident and that you could
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: have double well do without. Probably was that before or
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: after you you moved all the furniture.
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: It was in the middle of all that. We didn't
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: have to move the big stuff, but lots and lots
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: of boxes for you know, bits and pieces, so it
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: was very difficult. But anyway, it's done. He's happy, We're
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: all happy. I'm home and on the mend. I hope
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: you haven't had any incidents so.
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: Far. So far it's still been smooth sailing, and let's
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: continuous that way.
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, all right, we better get down to business now.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: We did only a week or two ago talk about this.
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: Suppose a discovery of phosphine in the atmosphere of Venus,
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: which the discoverers suggested could mean signs of life. But
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: then that was debunked, and it's sort of been going
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: backwards and forwards for the last as it turns out,
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: four years, four years since that discovery.
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: It's amazing, isn't it.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: And now it's back to theory number one because the
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: people who made that discovery have gone back to their
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: original concept with a new sort of element to add
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: to the argument. So they're again saying it is phosphene,
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  Speaker 1: and we know we are going to stand by this discovery.
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: That's correct. And I think that this one, this time,
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: it might stink, Andrew. I think it might be one
• 4:48
  Speaker 3: that is much harder to refute by the not the
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: naysay as, just the skeptics, the people who, as we
• 4:55
  Speaker 3: all do in the world of science, think well is
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: that really correct? So, yes, that discovery made back in
• 5:01
  Speaker 3: twenty twenty the same team basically, and actually that team includes.
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  Speaker 4: A really good friend of mine on the island of Hawaii,
• 5:10
  Speaker 4: and he loo that in fact, that's where the telescope
• 5:17
  Speaker 4: is and that's why he's there.
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  Speaker 3: The telescope is called the James Clark Maxwell Telescope. It's
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: not at Helo. It's on the summit of Mount Ica,
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: which is the mountain that really makes up, along with
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: Mount Loa, the bulk of the big island of Hawaii,
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: as you know, one of the best observing sites in
• 5:40
  Speaker 3: the world for Northern Hemisphere astronomy. The James Clark Maxwell
• 5:45
  Speaker 3: Telescope itself quite a well established, an old facility, and
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: unlike some of the other ones which all sit right
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  Speaker 3: on top of the mountain where you can see them
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  Speaker 3: from all over the island, and that caused it little
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: kinds of grief, which is quite understandable. The JCMT is
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: nestled in a valley on top of the summit. There
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: are values up there. It's quite an interesting geography, and
• 6:08
  Speaker 3: that's to keep it away from terrestrial microwave radiation, because
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: the James clok Wexwell Telescope is a microwave telescope. So
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: once again this team has pointed their telescope at the
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: planet Venus, but this time they have a new receiver
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: on the telescope, and that apparently is the game changer
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  Speaker 3: in this work. It's certainly giving them a good deal
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  Speaker 3: more confidence in the results that are coming out of it,
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: and much more of the data themselves. So basically and
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: that the bottom line is that in each of the
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: three observing campaigns they've done with the James Clerk Maxwell telescope,
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  Speaker 3: they've got one hundred and four times more data than
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: they did with the original detection. So that's why they
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: are much more confident in their results. This is a
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  Speaker 3: quote from Dave Clements, who's reader in astrophysics at Imperial
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  Speaker 3: College in London and one of the one of the
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: team members. What we've got so far indicates that we
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  Speaker 3: once again have phosphene detections and so that's, you know,
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  Speaker 3: it's a bold thing to do to go back to
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  Speaker 3: your original target, knowing perhaps that you've got a better
• 7:36
  Speaker 3: instrument and have another look. And it looks as though
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: they are much more confident. And there's also you know,
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: it's but wait, there's more story, because there is more
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  Speaker 3: to this. There is another observing team which is working
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: on a different part of the microwave spectrum and they
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: think they've detected the gas ammonia and that apparently is
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: is basically, you know, a bigger and even bigger puzzle.
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  Speaker 3: So quoting Dave Clements again, he said that is arguably
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  Speaker 3: more significant than the discovery of phosphine. We're a long
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  Speaker 3: way from saying this, but saying it anyway, we're a
• 8:28
  Speaker 3: long way from saying this. But if there is life
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: on Venus producing phosphine, we have no idea why it's
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: producing it. However, if there is life on Venus producing ammonia,
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  Speaker 3: we do have an idea why it might want to
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  Speaker 3: breathe ammonia.
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  Speaker 1: And that is.
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  Speaker 3: The interesting part of this.
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  Speaker 1: And just to.
• 8:50
  Speaker 3: Elaborate again in another comment from Dave Clements, phosphine has
• 8:54
  Speaker 3: been discovered in the atmosphere of Saturn, but that's not
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: unexpected because Saturn is a gas giant and there's an
• 9:01
  Speaker 3: awful lot of hydrogen in its atmosphere, so any hydrogen
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  Speaker 3: based compounds like phosphine or ammonia are what dominate there.
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  Speaker 3: But the same is not true of rocky planets like
• 9:13
  Speaker 3: our own and Venus and Mars. And that's why you know,
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  Speaker 3: the possible detection of these hydrogen based compounds phosphine and
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  Speaker 3: ammonia are so unexpected on Venus.
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  Speaker 1: Well, it does open up a can of worms, and
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  Speaker 1: it could be worms, I'm not sure, But what are
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  Speaker 1: the odds of it being life? I know they say
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  Speaker 1: they're a long way from saying it is, but it
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  Speaker 1: could be or what, well, I suppose the alternative question,
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  Speaker 1: what else could be causing the existence of phosphine and ammonia.
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  Speaker 3: That's that's the right way to look at it. The
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  Speaker 3: the well, it's very you know, dev clements is he
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  Speaker 3: is certainly talking the talk and giving us some very
• 10:02
  Speaker 3: good quotes here. Phosphine and pneumonia have both been suggested
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  Speaker 3: as biomarkers, including on exoplanets, so finding them in the
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  Speaker 3: atmosphere of Venus is interesting on that basis as well.
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  Speaker 3: When we published the phosphene findings in twenty twenty, quite
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: understandably that was a surprise. And so he makes the
• 10:24
  Speaker 3: point that other instruments have not actually made that detection,
• 10:33
  Speaker 3: and they include the Venus Express spacecraft, which is an
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: ISO spacecraft in orbits around Venus. They include and something
• 10:44
  Speaker 3: called the IRTF which is a NASA facility again on Hawaii,
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  Speaker 3: not actually very far from the gents Clark Maxwell Telescope
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: NASA Infrared Telescope facility, and observations made with actually an
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: observatory that another of my friends has worked on Sophia,
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: which was the airborne NASA observatory on that seven seven
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: four seven sp in the back of it that's now
• 11:09
  Speaker 3: no longer flying, but that when it was and also
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: obviously observed Venus and they didn't find these phosphine found finding.
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  Speaker 3: So there's a number of different investigations that have not
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  Speaker 3: turned up the gas phosphine. And I am getting to
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: the antity or question in a minute, Andrew and working
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  Speaker 3: round to it and there. But they've they've ruled out
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  Speaker 3: one of the things that was suggested as being a
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  Speaker 3: contaminant when that first lot of phosphine observations were released,
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  Speaker 3: and that was sulfur dioxide and that is basically ruled
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: out now by the Attakama large MILLIMETERSILIM array ALMA. But
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  Speaker 3: the key thing here, and again I'm going to quote
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  Speaker 3: Dave Clements. It turns out that all our observations that
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  Speaker 3: detected phosphene were taken as the atmosphere of Venus moved
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  Speaker 3: from night into day, and all the observations that didn't
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  Speaker 3: find phosphene were taken as the atmosphere moved from day
• 12:19
  Speaker 3: to night. And the suggestion is that the ultraviolet light
• 12:26
  Speaker 3: from the sun actually breaks up these molecules as it
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: moves from day to night. So you know, if you
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: take them at the end of the day, the molecules
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  Speaker 3: have all gone because the sun's basically baked it out.
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  Speaker 3: As Dave Clements puts it, all phosphine is baked out,
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  Speaker 3: and that's why you don't see it, Okay. Yeah, So
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: that suggests that the phosphine observations might be real and
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: they might be sort of being replenished, if I can
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: put it that way. Because if you got phosphene that
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: at the end of the day isn't there, it's been
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: baked out, but at the beginning of the day it
• 13:07
  Speaker 3: is there, it suggests that something is forming phosphene and
• 13:12
  Speaker 3: maybe that is an indicator of life.
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you've got to wonder what kind of life there
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: could be, and it would be residing in the upper
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: atmosphere because there's too wide for anything down on the planet.
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: That's correct, And there's nasty things as well.
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: There's all that sulphuric acid.
• 13:28
  Speaker 3: At lower levels in the you know, down in the
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: in the in the droplets cloud that sorry, the clouds
• 13:35
  Speaker 3: of venus further down. Yeah. So look, it's the suggesting
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: what they're suggesting.
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  Speaker 1: And this now is a quote from.
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: Actually once again from Dave Clements, so that we're going
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: to get another voice but.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: Ammonia. Actually, let me let me quote.
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  Speaker 3: Jake Graves or Grieves is professor of astronomy at Caldiff University,
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: and actually I think she's the leader of the team.
• 14:05
  Speaker 3: She says, the exciting thing behind this will be if
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: it's some kind of microbial life making the ammonia, because
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: that would be a neat way for it to regulate
• 14:15
  Speaker 3: its own environment. It's really interesting that they know that
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: they are so confident with these observations. They're actually trying
• 14:22
  Speaker 3: to look at what mechanisms living organisms might might be
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: using to create the phosphene or the ammonia. So I
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: think they'd put it at fifty to fifty. I'm just
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: reading between the lines here.
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: My self. I'd put it lower.
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: I think that maybe you know it's we've marked up
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: this tree so many times Andrew looking for rock solid biomarkers,
• 14:48
  Speaker 3: and they're very, very difficult to find. Even if you
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: find something that you think is only caused by living organisms,
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: there's probably always going to be another chemical way, purely
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: chemical way that you light form it and that might
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: not have been failed yet.
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: Right, So it could just be some kind of chemical
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: reaction you need to venus.
• 15:08
  Speaker 3: Maybe so caused by just the unusual conditions in the
• 15:12
  Speaker 3: pu atmosphere.
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well they certainly are unusual. Although we're really working
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: hard to get there ourselves, aren't we. It's yes, it's
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: a great story. Hopefully they're right about the phosphor and
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: the ammonia and hopefully and they're not absolutely saying that
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: it's caused by life, but let's hope it's true. It
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: would be wonderful to discover life beyond Earth as we
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: and our focus is on Mars and Enceladus and you know,
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: ice moons in general, but Venus Venus certainly sounds like
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: it's a candidate worthy of further investigation. This is space nuts.
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Andrew Dunkley here with Professor Fred Watson there Space Nuts.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: Now to another thing in astronomy and space science that
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: keeps popping up in the news, that of space debris.
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: And there's been plenty of debris hitting the ground in
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: recent times and it's starting to become a real concern.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: There have been incidents around Florida, there's been incidents in Australia.
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: It's happening in several places, and this is because we're
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: seeing so very many launches around the world, and Florida
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: has been a bit of a hotbed of space launches
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: in recent times. But that incident we talked about a
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: few weeks ago has it sounds like it's sort of
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: become the straw that's broken the camel's back in certain respects.
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: Fred I think that's correct.
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: Yes, So the bit of debuts that came through somebody's
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: roof in Florida, because no space lawch organization wants to
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: be responsible for something coming back and injuring or killing somebody.
• 17:05
  Speaker 3: Now that's not hapmed yet, but they're worried that it will.
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: But this is a little bit more specific than just
• 17:12
  Speaker 3: the very large numbers of spacecraft that are being launched.
• 17:16
  Speaker 3: It's to do entirely with the Dragon space capsules, which
• 17:23
  Speaker 3: are a product of SpaceX. They are flown on SpaceX rockets.
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: They're fucking nine rockets, and the Dragon capsules come in
• 17:33
  Speaker 3: two flavors. One is crew Dragon, which has humans on board,
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: and the other is the Dragon which doesn't, which is
• 17:41
  Speaker 3: a cargo spacecraft. So there are two different kinds and
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: they've both. They've been significant numbers of both actually which
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: have flown. In fact, if I can, I'll find it.
• 17:56
  Speaker 3: There have been I can't remember how any how many
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: of the Crew Dragon missions have been several, but there
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: have been more than twenty twenty of the Cargo Dragon missions.
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: So you see, you know, we make the Crew Dragon
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: missions tend to make big news because they're carrying astronauts.
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: The Cargo Dragon ones don't, and there are far more
• 18:21
  Speaker 3: of them. They're the ones that dock remotely with or
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: autonomously with the International Space Station, and sure enough they
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: unload cargo and that's great. So the Dragons, there are
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: more of them than we tend to hear about, is
• 18:37
  Speaker 3: what I'm getting at. But both of them, both the
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: Crew Dragon and the Cargo Dragon capsules have what is
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: called the trunk and that is basically it's what we
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: used to call the service module in the Apollo era,
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: and in fact, I think Boeing still call it the
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: service module for their Starlin spacecraft. But the trunk component,
• 19:05
  Speaker 3: so it's a cylindrical space vehicle which sits between the
• 19:12
  Speaker 3: capsule itself carrying either crew or cargo, and the launch
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: vehicle and I think it probably is the second stage
• 19:19
  Speaker 3: of the launch vehicle that it sits on top of,
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: so that trunk is the bit that is the culprit here,
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: because it's bits of those trunks that have fallen in
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: various different places, including Australia not very far from Canberra,
• 19:37
  Speaker 3: including the one that went through the roof in Florida,
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: including North Carolina and Saskatchewan in Canada. All of these
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: places have had bits of SpaceX Dragon trunks falling on them,
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: and so SpaceX have gone back to the drawing board
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: to look at why this is happening and to try
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: and understand how it can be prevented. And there are
• 20:01
  Speaker 3: two things I think that have changed. One is that
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: they have changed the landings of the Dragon spacecraft from
• 20:13
  Speaker 3: the East coast off Florida to the West coast off
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: the United States, so that they they will start landing
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: that the Dragon capsules themselves in the Pacific rather than
• 20:28
  Speaker 3: the Atlantic. In fact, they're basing their operations out of
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: Long Beach, California for the you know what's called post
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: flight processing, in other words, going and recovering the Dragon
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: capsules and then they will be transported across country back
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: to Florida for the next launch. So that's one thing
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: that they've done, and the other is that they.
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: Get a big thing that's not going to be changed huge.
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: That's right.
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: It's going to cost them because they're not just pulling
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: these things out of the water right next door to
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: where they're going to launch it the next time. It's
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: got to it's got to go across country. So yes,
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: it will cost them. But the other thing is that
• 21:10
  Speaker 3: they'll shift the time that the the re entry burn starts,
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: because I think, if I'm remembering this correctly, the situation
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: has been that they have separated the crew dragon capsule
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: from the trunk before they have fired the trunk burn
• 21:35
  Speaker 3: to bring it back, and I think they're going to
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: do that afterwards now, and I hope I've got that
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: the right way round. But the bottom line, you know,
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: we're not flying the spacecrafts, so it doesn't really matter,
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: but it's it's it's a change in the way that
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: they will actually initiate the re entry of the of
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: the trunk. And the hope there is that they will
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: that it will achieve higher velocity is to burn up completely,
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: but if it doesn't, it will fall in a much
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: more safe zone. It's much likely likely to fall over
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: ocean than overlearned.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: That's the bottom line, right, Well, it's good that they've
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: taken notice of the problem and they're making moves to
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: reduce the potential impact. So that'll come as a relief
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: to a lot of people and probably insurance companies too.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: I mean that sounds funny, but they've been talking about
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: it becoming a thing for homeowners and business owners in
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: certain parts of the world that have a lot of
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: these potential problems, and yeah, that could jack up premiums,
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: and it also reduces the risks of human life, which
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: is the most important thing. So it does sound like
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: they're making some positive moves.
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: Read Yes, that's right. I think it's a good outcome,
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: and let's see what happens.
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: Let's see indeed. Yes, if you'd like to read up
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: on that story, it's available on fizzphys dot org. This
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: is Space Nuts. Andrew Duncley here with Professor Fred Watson. Okay,
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: we tacked all portraits of being with air space Nuts.
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: One more thing before we wrap it up, Fred, and
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: a little bit of sad news. David Crawford David OL
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: Crawford passed away just in the last couple of weeks
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: at the age of ninety three. This is a fellow
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: who has worked for had a very long and wonderful
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: career in astronomy. And I believe you've cross paths with
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: David in your career as well.
• 23:43
  Speaker 3: Yes, indeed, that's right. So actually there's a very nice
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: tribute to David Crawford on the Sky Telescope website. Just
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: the first paragraph of that says it all. With the
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: peaceful passing of David L. Crawford on July the twenty second,
• 23:58
  Speaker 3: at the age of ninety three, we've lost the person
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: who taught the world about light pollution and warned us
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: all of the threat it poses not just to astronomy,
• 24:07
  Speaker 3: but to the entire nocturnal environment. So he basically spent
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: time at major observatories in the United States. He was
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: an astronomers exactly as you said. He got his doctorate
• 24:21
  Speaker 3: from the University of Chicago, spent time at Yerke's Observatory,
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: and basically wound up in Tucson, Arizona, at the kit
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: Peak National Observatory, which is the equivalent of Siding Spring
• 24:37
  Speaker 3: in the United States, and in context of our National Observatory,
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: here in northwestern New South Wales kit Peak, not very
• 24:46
  Speaker 3: far from Tucson, and basically he was really interested in
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: the structure of an evolution of star clusters and galaxies
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: absolutely you know front rank astronomy problems back in nineteen
• 25:03
  Speaker 3: sixty when he joined the staff at kit Peak, and
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: in fact he basically morph from that those studies into
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: the two great four meter telescopes that were being built
• 25:19
  Speaker 3: in the nineteen sixties and early seventies, and in fact
• 25:23
  Speaker 3: our Angle Australian telescope, which was commissioned exactly fifty years
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: ago in nineteen seventy four. That telescope was a copy
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: of at some level a copy and a general copy
• 25:36
  Speaker 3: in design of the two for meters that Dave Crawford
• 25:40
  Speaker 3: was responsible for, one at kit Peak that's called the
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: Male Telescope, and the other at the Sara Torolo Sero
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: Tololo inter American Observatory in Chile, which is now not
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: far far from Las Arena, if I remember rightly. So
• 25:56
  Speaker 3: these two big telescopes his mind and attention on what
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: could stop observatories, and he very quickly realized that one
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: hundred kilometers from kit Peek there was Tucson with half
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: a million people at that time, and that it was
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: a city that was getting brighter and brighter and that
• 26:20
  Speaker 3: was a threat to the environment of the telescopes. But
• 26:24
  Speaker 3: he basically went on a mission to encourage the city
• 26:30
  Speaker 3: to think about this, and they very quickly enacted legislation
• 26:37
  Speaker 3: to protect the darkness of kit Peek and that's where
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: it all started, so along with a gentleman called Tim Hunter,
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: who was an amateur astronomer who'd also been concerned with that.
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: So that was the start of the dark sky movement
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: in the world in during the nineteen eighties in particular.
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: Now I met Dave when he came here for Ducks
• 27:00
  Speaker 3: Sky Conference to Australia. It would have been probably twenty
• 27:03
  Speaker 3: years ago. I met him through another really good friend,
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: a colleague, sadly who also is no longer with us,
• 27:12
  Speaker 3: Reg Wilson. He was mister dark Skies in Australia. He
• 27:16
  Speaker 3: used to carry around with a newspaper cutting from nineteen
• 27:19
  Speaker 3: seventy three which said now it's light pollution, and it
• 27:23
  Speaker 3: was quoting him who, having worked with Dave Crawford, knew
• 27:30
  Speaker 3: what light pollution was all about and that it was
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: not just bad for astronomers, but bad in general.
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: Yes, it is, because it's bad for human health exposure
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: to light. We made darkness to get a decent night
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: sleep basics.
• 27:43
  Speaker 3: That's absolutely right. So it's all about circadian rhythms. And
• 27:47
  Speaker 3: I had my other half Maney. As you know, she's
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: talked about this on Space Notes. She's getting to be
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: a world authority on this as we speak. In fact,
• 27:56
  Speaker 3: she's doing a lot of radio interviews because National Science
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: Week hearing Usustralia next week as we speak today, that
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: will feature dark light pollution as its focus. So it's
• 28:09
  Speaker 3: become much more widely understood than it was before. We
• 28:13
  Speaker 3: now know as well that nocturnal animals and even some
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: non nocturnal species are badly affected by light pollution, so
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: we know much more about it. The International Dark Sky
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: Association was formed in nineteen eighty eight, and actually there's
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: a quote from the nineteen eight May nineteen eighty eight
• 28:36
  Speaker 3: issue of Sky and Telescope that reported on that formation.
• 28:42
  Speaker 3: It's now called Dark Sky International, but it was then
• 28:44
  Speaker 3: the International Dark Sky Association. Dave craw Crawford said lack
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: of awareness, rather than resistance to change, is generally the
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: biggest problem in controlling light pollution. And I think that
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: remains the case today. I think it's just people are
• 28:58
  Speaker 3: ignorant of what it's all.
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, and they need to be educated. And the
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: torch continues to be held by your good wife, Marni
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: and many other people around the world. But it all
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: started with this great man, and yeah, David L. Crawford,
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: who has passed away. Fred. We're going to end on
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: that note. Thank you very much.
• 29:22
  Speaker 3: Always a pleasure, Andrew, and we'll talk again soon.
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it could be a few minutes. It's that joke
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: run out of puff yet, I don't know, but let's
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: keep telling it. I didn't think it was a joke.
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: I just thought it was what we do next. Absolute
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: reality is all right, We'll see you soon, and don't forget.
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: By the way, if you are on social media, you
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: can watch us on YouTube, and don't forget to subscribe.
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: You can talk to other Space Nuts listeners via our
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: Space Nuts podcast group Facebook page or our other face
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: book page, which is the genuine article. But yeah, they
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: both get plenty of traffic. We're on Instagram, We're everywhere,
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: and we'll be back here very very soon with another episode.
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: Oh thanks to Hue in the studio for reasons I'm
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: still to glean. But thank you Hugh and from me
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: andrewd Uncley, thanks for your company. See on the next
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: episode of Space Nuts. Bye bye. You'll be listening to
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: the Space Nuts podcast available at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartRadio,
• 30:30
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• 30:37
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