[AstroNet] Scopex 2014 Telescope and Astronomy Expo

[Jerome Jooste]

The annual astronomy and telescope event – ScopeX – will be held at the Military Museum in Saxonwold on Saturday 13 September from 9am to 9pm.
 
It is organised by amateur astronomers and telescope makers and is currently celebrating its 13th  year.  Other than commercial telescopes, cameras and related equipment  to buy at special prices, we  always host a number of lectures in the J.C. Lemmer Auditorium.
 
10h30 : "Gaia Space Telescope - Status and Challenges" by William O’ Mullane, Gaia Mission Manager
(Gaia is a mission designed and operated by the ESA (European Space Agency) and is tasked to accurately plot 1 billion stars in our Milky Way Galaxy using 106 CCDs, 938 million pixels)
 
12pm "The Radio Astronomy Road to South Africa" by Francois Kapp, SKA
 
2pm "SA’s involvement in international space science missions from Rosetta to CubeSats" by Prof Herman Steyn, Stellenbosch University 
 
3pm " Observations of Near-Earth Asteroids and the Impact Hazard to Earth" by Dr Henry Throop, Univ Pretoria & PSI, Tucson
(Dr Throop is a Senior Scientist with the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, Arizona, USA  working with the New Horizons mission currently en route to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt. He was also a co-discoverer of Styx one of Pluto's moons)
 
Other lectures include "Building a geodesic dome for an observatory" and for the  photographers "How to succeed at astrophotography.
 
There is a ton of stuff to see and do other than the above including a raffle for a very nifty computerised telescope and a DSLR camera. 
 
We round the day off with an evening of stargazing using many of the telescopes on display during the day.
 
Please visit our website ScopeX.co.za for further info if needed.
 
Jerome Jooste
Chair ASSAJhb
072 985 8764
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