1. AURORA WATCH There is a strong possibility of an aurora being visible from Ireland tonight, Friday October 24. A solar flare ejected material towards Earth that is expected to hit us around 8pm. Watch the northern sky all night long, and check Saturday night also. If you see the aurora please TEXT a message to 086-081 99 86 (available 24 hours) saying where you are located and the time you first saw it. Please also email a report to observe@astronomy.ie as we are re-starting our Observers Log page in the December issue due out in a couple of weeks time. This activity comes from a colossal sunspot group now crossing the centre of the Sun (as we warned on our 1550-111-442 Newsline on Monday). You can see it by carefully projecting the Sun's image through a pair of binoculars or a small telescope on to a white card, Or you can look directly at it but only if you use our AstroSolar filter sheet (which we can post to you). The sunspot is enormous and was an amazing sight yesterday, looking like a large black hole in the dead centre of the Sun as seen in 10x50 binoculars fitted with AstroSolar. A sight I will never forget. Today FM (around 6pm) and 2FM (around 7:30pm-8pm) are both interviewing me this evening about this event! 2. LECTURE ONLINE Mark Sweetnam, the senior lecturer from Schull Planetarium, gave the annual Astronomy Ireland Lecture/Debate on October 13 in D.C.U. to a packed audience of almost 150 people. Whether you agree with Creationism or you're a "Big Banger" Mark is certainly an accomplished public speaker and a 'healthy' Q&A session followed. The Lecture has been digitised by new equipment we are experimenting with and is online for you to view right now at our website www.astronomy.ie (click on Lecture Webcasts at the left-hand side). In response to the query I put out a few weeks ago we were asked to make the lectures 'downloadable'. You can now, for the first time, download the entire lecture and watch it offline. Remember though that this is strictly for private use as the copyright notice on the Lecture Webcast page says: "Private viewing only. No re-transmission or public display allowed unless prior permission in writing is granted by Astronomy Ireland." 3. INTERNATIONAL SPEAKER Advance booking is strongly recommended for the next Public Lecture in D.C.U. (Nov. 10) and Cork (Nov. 11 in Jury's Hotel) when we will be bringing in J. Tate from SpaceGuard UK to speak about his organisation and "The Threat from Space". Already there have been more bookings for this talk than any other talk we have ever held so please call soon (number below) if you want to get a seat at either venue as it seems likely this lecture will sell out. Don't forget to book your "weekend pass" for Astro-Expo on Nov. 15&16 also - details and booking forms were posted to members and can be found on our website too. Speaking of which, our Administrator Tom Finnegan is looking for volunteers to help run the event . Please email tom@astronomy.ie if you might be available any time from Friday Nov. 14 to Sunday Nov. 16. 3. SPONSOR People have been joining Astronomy Ireland at a phenomenal rate this year and the society is about to celebrate the 8,000th person signing up as a member. Traditionally we have given a prize to the each "thousandth" member so we are seeking sponsors for a prize. In the past we've been donated satellite dishes, TVs, trips etc. Please ask your company if they would be interested in sponsoring a prize in the next few weeks. We will be promoting the event very heavily with our friends in the media and there will certainly be a feature published in our own magazine. It would be nice to announce the happy event at Astro-Expo, the one time each year when we hope to get all members together from around Ireland. Hopefully we have made this year's Astro-Expo programme exciting enough for you with USA, UK and key Irish speakers, not to mention all those exhibits! We are also seeking sponsors for Astro-Expo if you can help with this too? Please support Astronomy Ireland and our efforts to promote interest in astronomy in Ireland if you are not already a member by signing up at www.astronomy.ie/sub ===== David Moore BSc FRAS, Chairman, Astronomy Ireland, P.O.Box 2888, Dublin 5. Editor, "Astronomy & Space" magazine. ASTRONOMY SHOP: open until 6pm Mon.-Sat. Tel (01) 847 0777. Fax (01) 847 0771. www.astronomy.ie Email: info@astronomy.ie