Venus Transit Remote Webcast Event
Monday, June 7, 2004 at Prince Kuhio Plaza
A crowd gathered early on and stuck around well past the first and second contact of Venus within the disk of the sun. We had to get more chairs several times during the event Updating some images from webcams across Europe. IfA graduate student Michael Connelley was onhand for support and some quick calculations of angular size of Venus A brief moment of anxiety, as Gary and Mike were trying to find an actively updating website. Estimations of first contact were somewhat early The Venus Transit event was a great way to engage the community in an astronomical event that had historical significance
The 2004 Transit of Venus event drew many people from all walks of life within the community. It was enheartening to see several students and their families from schools the IfA Outreach Program and NASA Solar System Ambassador Program has visited. Several approached us and were not shy about asking insightful questions. Members of the astronomical community were also in attendance, along with Hilo Astronomy Club members, UH Hilo students and teachers from several schools.
Mahalo to Prince Kuhio Plaza for providing a venue for our event, helping to promote it, facilitating our network access and being an active supporter of astronomy in Hawaii. Mahalo to Sears for supplying a 36" flat screen television for our event, Oceanic Time-Warner for providing the network feed. Mahalo to B97-KWXX-KPUA for allowing Gary into their studios again, KBIG for not locking their doors when they saw him coming, and Hawaiian Rythms 92.7 for providing a remote broadcast. Mahalo to Astronomy Magazine for supporting our event with donations of free issues of their periodical, and to the NASA Solar System Ambassador Program for access to materials made avaialable to the general public. Mahalo to IfA graduate student Michael Connelley for supporting this event, along with his better half Cathy Ishida of Subaru Telescope. Mahalo to my wife and son for coping with a periodically absentee husband and dad, and supporting our outreach efforts. But most importantly, mahalo to the people of Hawaii Island, to whom this event and others like it are dedicated.
This could have been an Apple event, with 2 PowerBook G4 15", a PowerBook G4 17" and a G5 with a 23" HD display. Computers presented animations, movies, music and images of the transit from around the world.
"So did you hear the one about...".
One of several websites broadcast during our event, this one originating from the Nederlands (http://www.sterrenkids.nl). Image of the Venus Transit from Kauai, by Bernd Weferling of Joint Astronomy Centre, .http://www.jach.hawaii.edu/~berndw/