Story by Kiana Teixeira Palomar’s planetarium hosted the Astronomy Club’s annual star party on March 13.
At this event, the Astronomy Club set up the planetarium’s high powered telescopes and show students and their family and friends different celestial objects such as nebulae and star clusters.
Kira Flager was one of the many students that attended the event.
“I think it’s great,” Flager said. “It’s nice to see all the telescopes around. I brought my friends because I thought this would be a really nice event to show them.”
Students who attended the event were able to learn about astrophotography from the planetarium’s telescope expert Shaun Haynie.
During the event, Haynie spoke to students about the different types of telescopes and how to track different star clusters as the sky moves throughout the night.
“The fun part of Astronomy is getting to look through telescopes and look at different things,” Haynie said.
To share his love of astronomy with the students in attendance Haynie described how to use the telescopes and explained astrophotography.
“It’s a good way for us to share our love of astronomy with the people,” Haynie said.
President of Astronomy club, Stephanie Marquez was also in attendance at the event.
“Astronomy Club’s main purpose is to have an outreach for the community to get them to learn more about astronomy and more about the sky,” Marquez said. “There are a lot of misconceptions between astronomy and astrology we would like to clear up.”
“The event is just to get the students excited about space,” Marquez said.
If you wish to learn more about astronomy, Marquez encourages student to attend an Astronomy Club meeting.
Astronomy club meeting days vary. To find more information about Astronomy Club and when they meet next, visit palomarastronomyclub.wixsite.com/palomarastro.