Astronomy society guides locals through a solar experience

By Ry Clarke - Lethbridge Herald Local Journalism Initiative Reporter on August 17, 2022.

Herald photo by Ry Clarke Tom Anderson teaches Logan Anderberg and son Mikey about solar flares as daughter Rainbow takes a look at the sun through a solar telescope over the weekend at the Oldman River Observatory.

The Lethbridge Astronomy Society invited the public to its Oldman River Observatory Saturday afternoon for a chance to look at the sun through solar telescopes.

A rare opportunity with clear skies and no overcast made observation a perfect opportunity to look at the sun with a special filtered telescope that filters out all the light from the sun making it viewable.

“It’s a telescope that’s designed specifically for the sun, that’s the only thing you can look at with it. Right now, we know the sun is moving towards a more active phase of its life in 2025. It’s going to be at its most active. That’s called solar maximum and we’re ramping up to that. Which means there’s a few interesting things to see on the sun, there will be some sunspots, and around the very edge of the sun, we’ll see what are called solar flares. That’s kind of like fire, although it’s actually a little too hot to be fire, fire is too cold to exist on the sun. But they look like fire, these giant jets of plasma that come off of the sun and they come off everywhere. But you can only really see them around the edge through the telescope,” said Perry Sabey with the society, helping explain to guests what they were observing and the significance of the event.

“The sun is a little more active this year than in previous years. The sun goes through an eleven-year cycle, so it goes to sleep, and then it wakes up. At the peak of the cycle, you see more sunspots and more solar activity. More solar storms, which can cause more disruptions of communications and electrical things like that on Earth. Along with seeing more auroras. Then after its cycle passes the peak it starts to go back to sleep again, and it takes 11 years to go happen again,” added Tom Anderson, president of the society.

Visitors Mikey and Rainbow Anderberg were excited to see the sun with their dad, Logan Anderberg, saying it was a cool chance tot see the sun and look at the solar flares. Rainbow hopes to be the first person to go to Saturn, her favourite planet.

“That’d be cool. That’s not impossible because if you had a hot air balloon filled with hydrogen, you could actually float around in Saturn’s atmosphere,” encouraged Sabey, helping spur on a young astronomer in the making. “You wouldn’t be able to use helium, that’s what we use on Earth. But on Saturn that would be too heavy and you’d sink. So, you need hydrogen, and then the hydrogen has to be hot, and then it would float.”

Sharing wisdom and knowledge with guests at the Observatory the event was a success at showcasing the sun through a special telescope and helping teach those in attendance new things and expanding on their dreams to the sky.

“For those looking to start off in astronomy I recommend a good pair of binoculars and you can see planets like the Moon, that’s easy to find, and another good one is Jupiter. Jupiter is getting higher in the sky by fall. Saturn is a little bit harder to find, but you can find it,” said Sabey.