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WINT: Observing Time Awarded to High School Students from The Netherlands
Reference: ING Newsl., No. 9, page 35.
Article mirrored at: La Palma
server | Cambridge server
Other available formats: PDFWINT: Observing Time
Awarded to High School Students from The Netherlands
N. Douglas* (Kapteyn Institute, University of Groningen)
As well as extending
the borders of our knowledge of the universe, one of the tasks of Astronomy
is to communicate these efforts to the public and to encourage the emergence
of the next generation of astronomers. The Dutch graduate school “NOVA” recently
organised “WINT”, a competition amongst high school students throughout the
Netherlands. At stake for the forty or so contestants, from which four winners
had to be selected, was a trip to La Palma and share in two nights of observing
time with the Wide Field Camera at the 2.5m INT (the name of the project
means “winning” in Dutch, as well as being the acronym for “observing time
at the INT”).
The proposals were diverse, ranging from popular targets such as planetary
nebulae to challenging observations such as the smaller moons of Saturn and
minor planets. The main selection criteria were that the proposals should
be well researched and that the observing parameters had been checked, as
well as that data would be obtained which could be used for exercises in
the classroom later.
The winners were Caroline Straatman who was interested in the stellar colours
arising from galaxy collisions, Max Verhagen who wanted to obtain images
and colours of the stars and nebulosity in the Pleiades, Evelien Dam who
wanted to recover the smaller moons of Saturn, and Suyan Zhang who wrote
the best case for the Owl Nebula, a popular target. We also allocated secondary
programs for each of the school students, to be done if time allowed and,
in the case of Evelien’s project, to allow for the evident difficulty of
her prime target. The winners were all (near) school leavers of age 16–18.
Accompanying them were two students of Astronomy from the University of Groningen,
Else Starkenburg and Jakob van Bethlehem, myself, and a science reporter.
Prof Peter Barthel and Jacques Visser provided organisation and logistical
support in the Netherlands.
The prize included a guided tour of the island, visits to some of the observatory
facilities, and observing on February 24 and 25. By chance, the first night
coincided with an occultation of a star by a minor planet, the narrow footprint
of which passed through the Canary Islands! A webcam was set up to allow
the “folks back home” to follow the action and to contribute suggestions
via an interactive forum.
The weather on arrival at La Palma was poor, and this hindered the sightseeing
trip somewhat, the the extent of the problem only becoming apparent when
we were denied access to the mountain for the first night of observing (immediately
ruling out the occultation). This type of decision is not taken lightly,
as was confirmed the next day when we drove up to the observatory in a convoy
of (unusually slow) taxis. We were confronted with scenes of chin-high snow
dunes, heavy clearance machines, bitingly cold winds, and a generally pessimistic
feeling about the prospects of observing on this, our second and last night.
ING, sensing this also, had started to open the door to partial use of a
third night.
Students at the INT control room during
WINT observations. [ JPEG1 | TIFF1 ] [ JPEG2 | TIFF2 ].
In the end, and to everyone’s relief, we did in fact observe throughout the
entire second night, despite the imminent danger of the wind forcing the
dome to close. Data was obtained for all projects and we were even able to
put some preliminary results on the website, which was designed by another
student in Groningen, Christiaan Boersma. A victim of our own success, the
webcam could not handle the number of hits and failed at the moment supreme,
but we continued to receive messages of support and excitement from home
base. The data is bound to keep a large number of Dutch school children busy
in the coming weeks.
After a few hours sleep in the Residencia we learned that the weather had
again taken a turn for the worse and were further impressed when we spotted
what appeared to be a royal decree referring to the danger of high winds.
Due to fly back to the Netherlands early the next day, we decided that risk
of becoming stuck on the mountain was too much to ignore, despite the enticement
of further observing. Thus, we returned to sea level by way of a two-and-a-half
hour taxi ride in poor conditions, only to hear rumours that many flights
from La Palma had been cancelled. I will spare the account of chaos at the
overstretched airport at La Palma, but in the end we arrived back in Amsterdam
nearly two days later than planned. The first newspaper articles had begun
appearing, and the WINT project, we learned, would feature the coming weekend
in a national newspaper, as well as in a radio program to be compiled from
audio material gathered by the reporter who had accompanied us on the trip.
Despite the weather-related setbacks and delays, our little group continued
throughout to bask in the satisfaction of having visited the observatory
and having used the powerful Isaac Newton Telescope for a whole night, under
circumstances which came very close to us not even being able to leave sea
level during the entire trip. We enjoyed each other's company, and I was
moved by the first new message to appear on the website following our return,
written by Max, one of the participants: “I miss La Palma already...” Truly,
we did our share to guarantee the emergence of the next generation of astronomers!
¤
