Special Offer Evening Classes Events DVDs Shop 1. Astronomy Ireland Celebrates World Space Week This week from October 4 - 10 is World Space Week and Astronomy Ireland have several exciting events lined up to celebrate the largest annual space event in the world. Evening Classes To celebrate World Space Week we are launching our popular Evening Classes this Thursday, October 8, at various locations around the country. These fantastic classes are aimed at the beginner and cover everything you ever wanted to know about the universe but were afraid to ask. For more information and to enrol go to www.astronomy.ie/class. Special Cassini Lecture Professor Carl Murray, a member of the imaging team on the Cassini mission, will give a talk entitled "Cassini: New Views of Saturn". Professor Murray will discuss the incredibly successful Cassini-Huygens mission, showing guests some of the spectacular images taken by Cassini's cameras since the mission began. Professor Murray's talks will take place in Dundalk on October 8 and Dublin on October 9 and a DVD is available for everyone in Ireland. BOOK HERE ORDER DVD Last time Professor Murray spoke in Ireland, over 400 people packed into his lecture. Membership Offer As part of the UN International Year of Astronomy 2009, Astronomy Ireland is giving away 3 months membership FREE to all new members. To avail of this fantastic offer simply go to www.astronomy.ie/offer or call us on (01) 847 0777. 2. See LCROSS Impact The Moon This Friday morning, October 9, you can watch two Lunar impacts as NASA's LCROSS (Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite) mission will impact the Moon as planned. LCROSS will search for water ice by allowing its spent Centaur rocket to impact the permanently shadowed polar crater, and the satellite will then fly into the plume of dust left by the collision to measure its properties before also crashing to the lunar surface. Although this spectacle won't be visible from Irish skies, you can watch it live on the NASA website at 12:31pm (Irish time) on www.nasa.gov/ntv. For more information on LCROSS click HERE. 3. Mercury Close To Venus This week the planet Mercury will be visible in the early morning sky just before dawn (around 7am) providing us with a spectacular planetary display as it will be placed just 5 degrees to the lower left of the planet Venus, visible high in the East. Mercury will appear about 20 times dimmer than Venus, but will still be as bright as the brightest stars in the sky. Mercury will also pass extremely close to the slightly dimmer Saturn, again in the early morning before sunrise. Remember to email what you see to observe@astronomy.ie and we will try to include your observations in forthcoming issues of the magazine. Further details, with star maps, are in our magazine (special offer). 4. 'Planets Around Other Stars' - Lecture Report & DVD Following an announcement on RTE Television's The Afternoon Show on Monday, September 14, about 150 people packed our September Public Lecture to hear Dr. Chris Watson give a superb overview of SuperWASP - a project with heavy Irish involvement that detects planets around other stars. Dr. Watson described how 374 planets have been found around other stars, some of which have even been found from Irish soil. Some of the highlights of the talk were Dr. Watson's description of the SuperWASP project, the excellent videos and images explaining how the planets are found, the possibility of finding alien worlds in distant solar systems, and the thought that one of these worlds could be a new home for humanity in years to come. If you didn't manage to get along to the event you can own your own copy on DVD for just 7euro (plus p&p). To order simply call us on (01) 847 0777 or click HERE. To watch Astronomy Ireland Chairman, David Moore, on The Afternoon Show on September 14 go to www.astronomy.ie/video and to listen to an interview on Morning Ireland with Professor Alan Fitzsimmons of the SuperWASP project visit www.astronomy.ie/audio. Astronomy Ireland The world's most popular Astronomy Club www.astronomy.ie ( subscribe / unsubscribe ) Our Online Telescope Shop or Tel (01) 847 0777 Mon-Sat