Up on the top of Mauna Kea, the highest of the Hawaiian volcanoes theres some rather cool science going on. With such little light pollution, generally clear skies, and being above a fair amount of the earth's atmosphere, the summit of Mauna Kea is an ideal place for studying the stars, and many of the world's best telescopes are to be found here. We took a self-drive tour up to the top of the volcano to explore. At 4205m high its pretty damn tall, and we certainly felt the effects of the altitude. Even staying at the visitor's centre at 2800m for over an hour, didn't get rid of the issue, but it certainly helped.
The UK infrared telescope. Its just looks so British compared to the sleek modern domes that surround it.
We went for a short walk that was very slow due to the altitude up to the actual summit, away from the telescopes. There was occasionally the reminder that this is indeed still a volcano, albeit now a dormant one. The top of the volcano is sacred to native Hawaiians and so there is often much debate as to how much presence the telescopes should have on top of the mountain. Its a very complicated issue and certainly not as straightforward as just the scientists moving into a sacred area. The Hawaiians didn't care until their recent cultural awakening, though perhaps the scientists could have been more sensitive. Hawaiian culture is based on stargazing and navigation, so is this modern science just an extension of Hawaii's heritage.
The Subaru telescope opens up at sunset.
The Gemini telescope opens up for the night. The other one is in Chile. (Putting your telescopes far apart enables you to get a better idea of distances, just like having two eyes)
The UK infrared telescope, along with a small horde of tourists up watching the sunset.
A nice view on the way down. They force you off the top of the mountain pretty quickly after sunset so that the scientists can get to work. Headlights can really screw up their observations.
Saturn, viewed through a telescope.
But there's time for some stargazing back down at the visitor's centre. In fact, due to the lack of oxygen at the mountain's summit the brain doesn't work so well at altitude. Therefore the best place to view stars with the naked eye is at the visitor's centre, where they have viewings at the weekends (I'm guessing its still possible to "view" the stars during the week, but they have local amateur astronomers with their telescopes there at weekends and hot chocolate and the like!). Even if one of the guides giving a night sky talk was a little crazy with his science, the stars were incredible. Just so beautiful, and we got a good look at a planet or two through some of the telescopes. Pretty damn good!
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