Starlight? Too bright

Published 9:00 pm Saturday, August 12, 2006

There are some places in the world where the Milky Way is so bright, it can cast shadows.

Local amateur astronomers don’t expect to see that in urban Puget Sound.

They’d just like to be able to glimpse the galaxy in the first place – something that’s getting harder to do as urban “sky glow” grows with the population.

“It’s almost like the sky has been turned off in the last generation,” said Mark Folkerts, president of the Everett Astronomical Society.

More than 30 amateur astronomers from King and Snohomish counties are pooling their money and going in search of darker skies east of the Cascade Mountains.

Photo Gallery The whirlpool galaxy, also known as M51. M51 is 37 million light years… [ view gallery ]

The Dark Sky Site group, an auxiliary of the Seattle Astronomical Society, has about $20,000 in hand and is looking for a remote, hilltop patch of unwanted Eastern Washington land to call home.

The idea is to escape much of the region’s “light pollution” – the unwanted glare and wasteful output of light from a thousand different sources – to gaze deeper into the cosmos.

Imagine two skies.

One is the ancient blanket above our heads, where Greek gods and images of swans march unchanging paths.

The competing one is here on Earth, what the stars above us would see – a creeping, expanding constellation of interstates and exploding cities.

Looking downward, the eastern half of the United States shines like day, with areas around Seattle, Portland, Ore., Los Angeles and other urban centers spotting the West Coast like giant nightlights.

“It’s very sobering,” said Thomas Vaughan, president of the Seattle Astronomical Society. “Real dark skies are disappearing quickly.”

Amateur astronomers have a unique interest in dimming the lights, but they say everyone should be concerned.

Light pollution can adversely affect animals. For example, many sea turtle hatchlings on Florida beaches have died because they are drawn away from the ocean, where the brightest light would be reflected in completely natural conditions.

And astronomers say sending so much light upward, where it’s needed the least, is a waste of energy anyway.

There also are the philosophical reasons, though.

“Throughout human history, people have always been exposed to the wonders of the night sky,” said Folkerts, who lives in Clearview. “Now, I’ve seen estimates that 70 percent of the world’s population never sees the Milky Way.

“Something with that dramatic awe on people culturally throughout the centuries, and all of a sudden it’s gone? It makes you wonder if there’s some impact there.”

It’s not that the night sky is a blank sheet.

Even in Seattle and Everett, the naked eye or a basic pair of binoculars can suffice to enjoy the moon, Jupiter and brighter stars, such as Vega.

Vaughan, who has a doctoral degree in quantum mechanics, feels content just looking at nearby globular clusters.

But for avid amateurs, those closer objects are just the tip of the quasar.

Many now scan parcels of space for distant exploding stars, called supernovae, findings they forward from their back yards to the data sheets used by professionals.

Such phenomena, along with most nebulae and galaxies, are so distant and faint, nothing short of a dark sky will do.

Members of the Seattle Astronomical Society had been talking about the idea of a dark sky site for several years, but it wasn’t until a 2004 banquet that they started putting money down.

“It was a twinkle in our eye for a while,” said Vaughan, one of the effort’s original backers.

Buying land is a big prospect for a nonprofit group.

The club is raising the money by setting up a separate membership roster. Dark Sky members pay $250 up front to help with the land purchase, then $85 a year when the site is set to secure their access.

In addition, an anonymous donor is matching other contributions, up to $15,000. Those are tax deductible.

The group plans to take out a loan for half the cost of the land. It would save some of its cash to make immediate improvements, such as concrete pads for telescopes.

Eastern Washington is the prime locale.

It’s not too far away, there are more cloudless days, a higher elevation means less atmosphere to cut through, and fewer people means less light.

“It’s a great combination,” Vaughan said.

So far, the group has visited five possible sites, from Yakima to Winthrop. It’s not currently pursuing any of them.

Groups in Portland and Vancouver, B.C., also are looking for dark sky sites, Vaughan said. If the Seattle-based effort is successful, it could be the first such site in the Pacific Northwest, he said.

The Dark Sky group thought the problem would be raising money, not finding land. It’s finding the opposite is true now.

Real estate agents struggle to understand what the group wants, said Scott Cameron of Lynnwood, the group treasurer.

“It’s like someone saying, ‘Hey, we want to buy a used dump.’ Everything that people usually look for is what we’re not looking for,” he said. “We think we’ll be able to find a site. It’s just a matter of knocking on a lot of doors.”

Still, even popular stargazing sites in Eastern Washington, such as Table Mountain near Ellensburg, are starting to see orange creep on the horizon.

“Where … you go is the short-term question. That’s escaping the problem,” said Folkerts, a member of the Dark Sky group. “The longer-term question is how to have a long-term impact on the problem (of light pollution), so it’s not so severe.”

Astronomers say the solution to light pollution doesn’t require a blackout. Reasonable lighting rules and fixtures that direct light downward are good answers.

Some communities, such as Lake Stevens, address light pollution in their ordinances. Often, the rules are aimed at being good neighbors as much as protecting nighttime views.

Redmond has what some call a model lighting ordinance, requiring shielded light fixtures and explicitly encouraging protection of “dark night skies.”

Island County six years ago passed a similar lighting ordinance with an eye to the night sky.

As a result, Snohomish County PUD has started phasing in fixtures that direct more light downward across its service area, which includes Camano Island.

Not all are hot on the trail of light pollution.

“There are so many other forms of pollution that are more compelling,” said Dr. Don Dillinger of Snohomish, a member of the Everett Astronomical Society. He is not part of the Dark Sky group.

Once troubling problems such as dioxin and lead are taken care of, Dillinger said he might be more likely to cringe at the sight of streetlights, like many of his astronomy colleagues.

Still, Dillinger said he recognizes the impact light pollution has on viewing and, in turn, the awe factor that drew him and so many others to astronomy.

“If you’ve ever gone into the back yard, laid on the ground and looked up, you get a feeling that’s almost confusing … the immensity of space,” he said. “It communicates a sense of wonder and curiosity – and humility.”

Each month, members of the Island County Astronomical Society haul their telescopes to the parking lot at Fort Nugent Park in Oak Harbor, eager to share views of the moon and the Andromeda galaxy with starry-eyed children and curious adults.

In the last year, new housing developments have gone up across the road from the park.

Club member Rick Owens said he and others worried the lights from the hundreds of homes would force them to find a new place to host their star parties. But it turns out Island County’s lighting ordinance has diminished the impact, he said.

News of the Dark Sky project by mainlanders was welcome to the group.

“I go to a star party in Eastern Oregon, and the reason I drive nine hours one way to get there is because it’s one of the last places in the Pacific Northwest that’s truly dark,” Owens said.

Michele Anderson of Langley was one of the visitors to the club’s most recent star party.

A transplant from California, she recalled friends who had never heard of the Milky Way, much less seen it.

“We were amazed to see all these stars we knew but kind of forgot about,” she said of moving to Whidbey Island a year ago. “There’s this whole universe taken for granted because we can’t see it.”

It was the first time looking through a telescope for Taylor Lawson, 12.

The Coupeville girl marveled at the faint blur of the Dumbbell Nebula and the craters in the moon seen through large telescopes.

“It’s visible, like a really pretty rock on the ground. I didn’t know there was this much out there,” she said.

At a modest telescope, 6-year-old Haley McConnaughey of Freeland stood on a crate to reach the eyepiece and look at Jupiter, her favorite planet.

Haley is the youngest member of the Island County Astronomical Society. She keeps a detailed logbook with notes and drawings of what she observes.

“It just makes me feel very good when I look up at the stars and planets,” she said.

A dark sky membership involves:

* A one-time $250 membership fee, which is transferable.

* An $85 annual fee once a site is purchased.

Further donations to the land purchase effort are tax-deductible and will be matched by an anonymous donor, up to $15,000.

For more information and a membership form, visit www.seattleastro.org/dark-sky.html, e-mail president@seattleastro.org or call 206-523-2787.

Reporter Melissa Slager: 425-339-3465 or mslager@heraldnet.com.