By Sheldon Spackman

Largest publicly accessible telescope in central Alberta at KWNC

Apr 23, 2018 | 12:59 PM

Officials with the Kerry Wood Nature Centre in Red Deer are enjoying the benefits of a powerful new telescope obtained over the Christmas holidays.

The purchase made in large part thanks to a very generous donation from Calgary resident John Anderson, has allowed staff and visitors to see a lot more than they otherwise could from a less powerful lens.

Alice Koning, Lead Astronomical Interpreter, Kerry Wood Nature Centre says the gift from Anderson was used to purchase a new 12 inch reflector telescope.

“So far, we’ve used it with our Family Astronomy Clubs which meet in the evenings normally,” Koning explains. “We’ve seen with them probably the most fantastic thing was the Orion Nebula where you can actually see the green gases where the stars are forming. Now since we’ve got our solar filter in and it’s nice enough out during the day, we’ve been looking at the sun.”

She anticipates more great viewing opportunities this summer however when Mars, Jupiter and Saturn all come out at some point.

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“I’m so excited to see Saturn through this thing, it’s going to be awesome,” exclaims Koning. “So far mostly we’ve looked at stars, the moon and the Orion Nebula.”

Koning says members of their Family Astronomy Club also love looking through the powerful new telescope.

“Most people really don’t get a chance to look through a telescope this big,” admits Koning. “You see different things than you would with binoculars or a smaller telescope. So being that they haven’t seen a telescope this big, they haven’t seen the Orion Nebula in that much detail for example.”

She adds they’ve also developed four new school programs involving the Sky-Watcher made telescope.

“Grade four and grade eight have an optics component in their curriculum and grade six and grade 9 have an astronomy component,” says Koning. “All four of those built a program off of the telescope here.”

Todd Nivens, Executive Director, Kerry Wood Nature Centre says it’s the largest publicly accessible telescope in central Alberta.

“It will also be used as the core of our Science Literacy Week programming that we’re working on with Red Deer Catholic Regional Schools in September,” reveals Nivens. “St. Thomas Aquinas Middle School but it will take part in the whole district.”