- Intro – Lauri Roche
- Manned Space Flight – Rocket Fuel Ignition – Jeff Pivnick
- Mercury to Apollo missions – alcohol, Hydrazine
- Space Shuttle & Artemis – solid and liquid fuel
- Read the book “Ignition” for more info
- Canadian sovereign Space Launch – Chris Gainor
- David McGinty, Minister of National Defence announced today a Canadian sovereign Space Launching site near Canso in Nova Scotia – Maritime Launch
- Canada has previously used rocket launch facilities based in the USA (NASA, SpaceX), Russia (Roscosmos), Guyana (ESA)
- Rockets: Black Brant
- Satellites: MDA
- Comdev International – Canadian firm acquired by USA
- Cassiopeia (DND), Alouette (civil) – satellites launched in the past
- Communication satellites in geosynchronous orbits
- Discussion about Reflect Orbital (proposed) and SpaceX satellites
- Compound Eyes Telescopes – David Lee
- Sky & Telescope article – Dragonfly (now MOTHRA) – Deborah Lokhorst, NRC
- Using a large array of lenses with tilt-able filters to study large diffuse objects withlow surface brightness
- Greenland Telescope – Natasha van Bentum
- Northwestern corner of Greenland 1,200km above the Arctic Circle
- 12m radio antenna
- Preparation and building of telescope
- Part of Event Horizon Telescope – a virtual telescope the size of the Earth
- Thule, now Pituffik Space Base (USA)
- Will be moved to a Summit Station, high in Central Greenland ice sheet
- Sundials – Randy Enkin
- Solar image taken by Vince Geisler
- When the Sun is at its highest, it is local Noon and precisely to the South (from the Northern Hemisphere)
- British Sundial Society
- Earth’s rotation: 15º per hour
- Solar compass – determine North without needing magnetism
- Types of sundials – Polar, Horizontal and Vertical
- Historic sundials
- The Sun is offset slightly compared with Earth’s orbit causing longer and shorter days seasonally, illustrated by an analemma composite photo
- The equation of time
- Digital Sundial
- The Meridian Sun Clock in Beacon Hill Park – built by RASC Victoria and installed by the Round Table Club in 1947
- Oak Bay installing non-compliant streetlights in Uplands – Moira Hourigan
- Uplands has cross-connected storm and sanitary sewers which need to be fixed
- Oak Bay is also replacing the streetlights
- Dave Robinson and others have tried to persuade Oak Bay to select a dark sky compliant fixture, to no avail
- RASC Victoria will measure light pollution levels before and after the “upgrade”
- Do we need a budget item for light pollution abatement? Victoria Council has yet to approve our budget.
- Discussion of headlight glare. Transport Canada survey
- Events – Lauri Roche
- Highlands Star Party on Friday or Sunday Night depending on weather – volunteers ready
- Astronomy Day – April 25 – need volunteers
- General Assembly – May 2 – online registration soon
- Sid Sidhu’s telescopes will be introduced to members over the coming months by David Lee
Video recording of meeting
Astronomy Cafe – Mar 16, 2026