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Space Topics: Planetary Analogs

Stars Above, Earth Below

Astronomy and Space Exploration in America's National Parks


Introduction

by Tyler Nordgren
Astronomer, University of Redlands
Email me

Milky Way over Yosemite
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Milky Way over Yosemite
The light of the Milky Way shines down on campers in Yosemite Valley in this mosaic of the dark night skies within the California park. Credit: Dan Duriscoe and Chad Moore, National Park Service

The national parks in the United States are fast becoming one of the few places that the average person can go to see a truly dark sky. When I talk to my students and ask if any of them have ever seen the Milky Way, only a small handful are ever able to say "yes," and often the occasion was some childhood trip to a national park. Today a dark starry sky is as much an integral part of a park visit as seeing Old Faithful or the Grand Canyon. But astronomy encompasses more than just the sky above the parks; it’s embodied in the very landscape that gives the parks their reason for being. Walk amid the thermal pools of Yellowstone National Park, and with far less imagination than one might think, you can see the newly discovered geysers of Saturn’s moon Enceladus. While in the red rock parks of southern Utah you can be an astronaut walking in the wheel-tracks left by distant rovers rolling across the ruddy vistas of Mars.

Cold Faithful
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Cold Faithful
Old Faithful erupts by the light of Saturn and a starry sky. Planetary scientists can understand thermal phenomena on other worlds by studying similar examples here at home. Credit: Tyler Nordgren; Saturn image courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech

In some cases this connection between astronomy and park, isn’t simply left to the mind’s eye. For a number of parks in the American Southwest, monuments and rock wall markings are arranged in alignment with the sun and moon on special dates determined by the orientation of the Earth in its orbit around the Sun. Standing in the presence of one of these structures on a spring equinox, one is struck by how long astronomy has been a part of these places, and how the night sky is not just a natural resource, but a cultural one as well.

Realizing these connections is the purpose of this blog. Over the course of the next twelve months I will be traveling from park to park with the help of the National Park Service and its Night Sky Team of rangers and astronomers dedicated to preserving dark night skies in the nation’s parks. Thanks to support by The Planetary Society I will be spending one to three weeks in each of these parks talking to experts and park visitors and giving a series of public lectures on the material I will be developing for the eventual accompanying web material and book. I will be writing regularly from the road with updates on my progress (anyone know where the nearest wireless hotspot is to Chaco Culture National Historic Park?). Along the way, I also hope to get a better idea of what the average person thinks about astronomy and planetary science. In the same way that these parks are our parks, space exploration is only possible if we as a populace feel that it is important.

A Thousand Years of Astronomy
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A Thousand Years of Astronomy
Petroglyphs of the moon, supernova, and a comet (bottom wall) in Chaco Culture National Historic Park in northwestern New Mexico attest to the importance of astronomy to cultures over the ages. Credit: Tyler Nordgren

I invite you to come along with me. You can email me during my travels.

I am visiting 12 parks over 12 months from 2007 to 2008. The parks I will be visiting (and the dates I will be there) are:

  1. Denali National Park (July 1 - 3, 2007)
  2. Rocky Mountain National Park (Aug 8 – 22, 2007)
  3. Grand Teton National Park (Aug 26 - 29, 2007)
  4. Glacier National Park (Sept 1 – 8, 2007)
  5. Acadia National Park (September 20 – October 16, 2007)
  6. Great Smoky Mountains National Park (October 17 – 25, 2007)
  7. Chaco Culture National Historic Park (December 1 – 22, 2007)
  8. Grand Canyon National Park (January 6 – 27, 2008)
  9. Yellowstone National Park (February 3 – 24, 2008)
  10. Arches National Park (March 28 – April 18, 2008)
  11. Yosemite National Park (May 4 – 11, 2008)
  12. Bryce Canyon National Park (June 1 – 25, 2008)
Map of U. S. parks
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Map of U. S. parks
Map of the U.S. parks I will be visiting over the next 12 months. Credit: Mark Kumler, ESRI, and Tyler Nordgren