Star Party (April 21, 2018)

As part of the activities of the Global Astronomy Month, AWBNigeria joined other Teams around the world to have a Star Party in the evening of April 21, 2018. The event held at the ever busy Jabi Lake Park in Jabi, Abuja.

The weather was kind to us on the day because we have been experiencing cloudy weather for most periods in this month. The moon came out for the Party as well. Venus was on our horizon. The brightest stars were Venus, Spica, Sirius, Canopus, Atria, Acrux and Rigel Kentaurus. We educated a lot of interested passer by’s about Stars, Astronomy, Our goals and activities and entertained their questions. We had a celebrity guest present at the Star Party, Rear Admiral Isaac, the former Defense Space Administrator. He was actively involved as he shared his wealth of knowledge about how to use stars for navigation.

Our Vixen Telescope was the star of the day as usual. It presented us with clear visuals of the Moon, Venus and the other stars. Below is the gallery showing the activities at the Star Party.

International AstroPoetry Contest for GAM2018

Entries are open for poems written in English Language for Global Astronomy Month 2018 AstroPoetry Contest. Write your poem in Astronomy, Night sky or space-related subject. The contest rules are as follows:

  1. Poems must be written in English. Original poems written by contestants will be accepted. Please do not send poems copied from books, the internet, or previously published, in any form.
  2. Teachers, please review all of your students’ poems before submission
  3. Poems may be on any astronomy, night sky, or space related subject
  4. Poems may be in any style or form. It is preferred that they be less than 30 lines in length
  5. The contest winners will be chosen by an International panel of judges
  6. Closing date is 1 May, 2018
  7. Participation certificate will be provided by Universe Awareness Malaysia
  8. Please submit your full name on the form exactly as you would like to see your name displayed on a certificate, should you win. Winner certificate will be provided by Astronomers Without Borders
  9. Prizes- TBA
  10. Share a line of your poem with or without an image on Facebook or Twitter using #GAM2018 (@gam_awb) and #universeawarenessmalaysia
  11. Write your poem in the space given in the form below:

GAM 2018 Astropoetry entry link

Cloudy Yuri

Against the odds that the weather posed in the evening of April 14, we celebrated our Yuri’s night at Julius Nyerere Crescent, Asokoro. The team worked hard on their preparations and publicity prior to the event but Mother Nature had her own plans.

Regardless, we had an eventful Yuri’s night. On arrival at the venue for the event, we set up our Telescope and like a magnet it attracted many curious bystanders. They wanted to know what the Telescope could do and the purpose for the event. This created an opportunity which we used to educate them about Astronomy, Yuri Gagarin and the capability of our Telescope & Binoculars.

We had giveaway flyers that had top facts about Astronomy, Space travel and Yuri Gagarin. We also had light refreshments for our audience. The clouds made it impossible to view any stars and the moon nevertheless, curious people used it to view objects in the distance. We had a star chart in order to show people the location and names of stars. We had several people that were seeing a Telescope for the first time, Kids that were excited about Astronomy and lots of questions to answer.

It was a lovely day and another step in the right direction for AWB Nigeria. One People, One Sky.