Date: December 21, 2010
Title: SpaceFest
Podcaster: Charles F. Dibbs
Organization: http://www.planetarium.vbschools.com/
Description: In February 2009 I traveled to San Diego, Ca to attend Spacefest. While I had some idea of what I would encounter, I was completely surprised at just how spectacular the this event would be. In the span of just 3 days I toured JPL, Griffith Observatory, Mt. Palomar, and experienced Spacefest itself. This show is about some of the people I met and things I expereinced while I was out there.
Bio: Since July 2001 Charles Dibbs has been the director of the Virginia Beach City Public Schools Planetarium in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Born in 1964, Charles became enamored with space and astronomy when he was just five years old by watching Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin bouncing around the moon in 1969. A wearer of many hats during his lifetime, Charles found his calling in education in the early 1990’s and today he proudly calls the city of Virginia Beach his home and his employer. When he’s not teaching school children of all ages about the sky he enjoys reading, playing golf, and especially spending time with his family and children. Although his head can often be found tilted toward the sky, his wife Cara, son Nolan, and daughter Finley keep him grounded with the pleasures of family life. It is not uncommon for his three and five year old to be clinging to his legs as he tries to go to work in the morning and jumping into his arms as enters the door at the end of a day. It is indeed a wonderful life.
Today’s sponsor: This episode of “365 Days of Astronomy” is sponsored by Mike Smithwick, author of the award winning astronomy software, Distant Suns, now for the iPad and iPhone.
Transcript:
Hello out there, This is Chuck Dibbs talking to you from Virginia Beach City Public Schools Planetarium in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
If you’re listening to this podcast you probably have a wee bit of geek blood in you like I do. Doesn’t take much, but, we are what we are right. And that means just about anything affiliated with space or astronomy might get our blood flowing a little bit faster. That’s a good thing.
Well I thought for this episode I’d talk to you about an event I experienced almost two years ago that brought together almost everything I liked. Everything in one place. I thought somebody like you guys just might find it interesting as well. That event was called Spacefest 2.
Now the rest of this story might sound like an advertisement for Spacefest, and to some degree it might be, but it’s not because I’m being compensated. I don’t know the people personally that organize that event. I just know it’s an incredible event. The reason I’d like to describe it here is because the whole thing continues to occupy a special place in my memory. I just want to share it.
Really, it was almost surreal, so let’s get to it.
I knew in advance as I was heading out to San Diego it was going to be fun, but I was totally unprepared for just how fun it turned out to be.
It was February now and out here on the east coast and certainly in the Mid Atlantic states that’s one of the coldest months we have. But flying to balmy southern California, well that had me thinking happy thoughts.
In addition I was also thinking, am I really going to be bumping elbows with Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo era astronauts? I mean, that’s what the Spacefest web site said. In addition to all of the astronauts present some of the biggest names in astronomy and space exploration were also scheduled to be there. They were going to be presenting on their findings and having talks about their projects. There were also some celebrities there as well. Outside of the world of space and astronomy, but for example, some space actors and actresses. I thought it was cool. Captain Apollo, whose name escapes me unfortunately, but he was from the original Battlestar Galactica, he was there. I was bumping elbows with him.
Attendees could listen to these talks from the movers and shakers of their respective astronomically related fields. That’s not a big deal to your average layperson, but a huge deal to someone like me who teaches school children of all ages about space and astronomy each and every day I go to work.
Spacefest was essentially offering me a chance to get cutting edge, update information from the very scientists doing the exploring. Information I could then transfer into my lessons here in the planetarium. That fact alone made the journey worth it to me.
Anyway, let me describe what I saw when I was out there. Believe it or not before the conference even got started I headed up to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory up in Pasadena. As a solar system ambassador I volunteer my services to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory spreading the enthusiasm of space exploration. Kay Ferrari who is the director of the SSA program had a long standing offer that if any of the ambassadors were in Pasadena they could come and get a behind the scenes tour and I took her up on that offer. It was kind a short notice but she was able to work me in and I was very, very grateful.
This was the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, mind you. A place, you know, is kind of like hallowed ground for space exploration. This is the nuts and bolts of where it’s happening. And believe me, it was very cool. She showed me all kinds of things and I can’t get into all of it here but I will say the coolest part was going to the mission control center. I stood on a balcony and overlooked the whole thing. I felt like I was on the bridge of the starship Enterprise on some imaginary five minute mission. You were looking at this big, gigantic electronic board which had a picture of whatever radio dish around the world that they were using I suppose. Madrid, Canberra, Goldstone make up the deep space network and one of those dishes has to be pointed at a spacecraft. So they have these big boards with all the slots filled in with all the times and then the signals I guess are transmitted or can be transmitted during those times. It really was interesting, at least to me.
So that was special, but the whole tour ended in mid afternoon so I got to see all these cool things at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and then, mid afternoon obviously Kay is an employee and she has to work out there so she sent me on my merry way but she did say come back to the Theodore Von Karman auditorium that night. There was a special event going on. It was a Thursday night and she said come back, you’ve got to check it out, and I did. But, I had to wait a few hours and I had to find something to do in the interim, so I shot on over to the Griffith observatory, which is only about twenty minutes up the road from JPL…had never been to Griffith before. But anyway, I had to get back to JPL for that event. It was the beginning of the International Year of Astronomy now, and what they did being so close to LA and Hollywood I guess they could secure an actor who was incredible. He was completely dressed as Galileo, he had the dialect and the accent of Galileo and he was describing everything he was looking at through his telescopes, you know, and just making us feel as though we were there as we were making the discovery. It really was special and I was glad to be a part of it, just serendipitously really, because I had no idea it was going to take place.
But anyway, that ended later in the evening that night and I had a three hour drive to get back to my hotel down near San Diego, so I was pretty tired by the end of that first day but feeling a buzz, you know, I was like wow, this is incredible, I can’t believe I’m out here taking all of this in.
Well, after a sounds night sleep I woke up bright and early to get that early jump on the town and country conference center to experience Spacefest. I just couldn’t image really what I was going to encounter when I got there. Gave my ticket, walked in the door, and saw all kinds of tables, skirted tables with all kinds of people sitting at these tables, and then upon closer inspection…these were astronauts. These were the astronauts themselves. Each one was sitting at a specific table signing not just autographs, but I think they were signing for pay, right. You could pay money to these guys and they’d sign I guess whatever you brought with them, or with you. Now I wasn’t there for an autograph, I’ve never been an autograph seeker. To me, I just like to get a picture with whoever I think is important and to me these astronauts were important.
I walked right by a table with Scott Carpenter…nobody was there. I’m looking, is that really Scott Carpenter I’m looking at? One of the original Mercury astronauts. Wow, he’s sitting there, got his hands folded on top of the table just smiling and waiting for somebody to come up. I don’t know if people didn’t recognize him of if people couldn’t read the sign behind his table that said “Scott Carpenter”, or maybe they just didn’t know who Scott Carpenter was…but I did and I couldn’t wait to go over there. Now I was a little nervous, I mean he was the first guy I went up to…I was nervous, but, he made me feel right at home. He invited me behind the table to take the picture, and of course I had to find somebody else to take the picture. Did that a lot, actually. Come to find out almost everybody there was very friendly, I think we all knew that it was something special. And who knows, I mean, this program, this space program it’s forty years in the making plus, fifty years I guess and who knows how long these national treasures are going to be around. I do consider the astronauts national treasures.
I’m walking around I’m seeing Gene Cernan, Charlie Duke, Buzz Aldrin, Michael Collins. Michael Collins and Buzz Aldrin, they flew on Apollo 11. The hair was standing up on my arms, I’m not kidding you. And the list of astronauts that were present goes on and on, not just golden age astronauts, but space shuttle astronauts, international space station astronauts, Apollo Soyuz guys were there, it was just special.
One of the triage of astronauts that were there were Dave Scott, Jim McDivitt,
and Rusty Schweickart, and all three of these gentlemen flew aboard Apollo 9. What made this cool for them is that this was close to the 40th anniversary of their flight, this whole timing of this Spacefest. And their space capsule, the command module GumDrop is exhibited in the San Diego air and space museum. That night, the night of the first day of the conference that I went to they were holding a special gala if you will at the San Diego air and space museum where these astronauts were going to be in front of their space capsule and you get could a photo opportunity. These guys were the actual astronauts that flew in the space capsule. It was cool. And I did get to get my picture with those guys in front of that space capsule. I still have that picture and it’s one of my most treasured possessions.
But anyway, the rest of this conference at the San Diego air and space museum, it was a private, catered event…they closed the museum. They closed it. And they had high end hordourves there, beverage of any kind we’ll say, and all of the astronauts as part of the conference were there, as well as the space scientists, and celebrities, and you could walk around and talk to these people as if they were you friends. I mean they were all so humble and gracious, and approachable…none more so than Seth Shostak. This guy, he came right up to me, I’m sitting down, I’m having a drink and eating some smoked salmon and he and a guest sat right beside me and struck up a conversation with me, which I thought was very cool.
We talked at least for thirty minutes about SETI, the Allen Telescope Array, when Seth thought we would make first contact, other things extraterrestrial in nature, and I just felt he made the added effort to make me feel comfortable in that atmosphere. Really, really, cool guy. I asked him for a photo but towards the end of our conversation he was kind of on the move, but he said he’d get back to me and he did. Later on in the event he found me and said let’s get that picture and I thought that was pretty cool. If you ever do get to meet that guy make sure you’re prepared to laugh until your sides split because he’s really down to earth and he’s got an incredible sense of humor. He’s a real person and of all the people I met and a lot of special people were there, he’s by far my favorite.
I also had real conversations with Geoff Marcy, Carolyn Porco, David Levy, Carolyn Shoemaker, I mean I’m name dropping hard here but really I’m not doing justice to all the people who were there and I can’t even remember all of their names. It was special.
Charles Kohlhase who most people probably don’t know, but maybe you do he helped orchestrate the Voyager missions back in the 1970’s, he helped design them and get them off the ground. At one of the dinners, or at the dinner to sum up the banquet, the culminating event of the conference, I got to sit at his table. He sat just to my right and once I discovered who he was and what he accomplished in his field I peppered him with question after question, it’s something I’m not proud of of course, but I just had to know, I mean here I was in an incredible banquet, Buzz Aldrin sitting right behind me, Michael Collins at the table to my left, everywhere you look there is somebody incredibly important in the space and astronomy field, and I’m sitting next to a guy who threw two of the deepest spacecraft we ever launched out into space, and he’s answering the questions for me like only an insider could. I still use all of the information that he gave me in my lessons in the planetarium. It was spectacular.
Anyway, my times almost up here. I want to let you know that Mt. Palomar is just a couple hours north of San Diego and I did take the two hour drive and headed up to Mt. Palomar, got a special tour, even got to have my picture taken underneath the 200 inch telescope there.
During my conversations with David Levy and Carolyn Shoemaker they told me they discovered comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 at Mt. Palomar, I didn’t even know that. They told me that but they said we didn’t use the 200 inch, there was a 16 inch out on the perimeter there we use that one. Of course they were with Carolyn’s husband Eugene at the time, god bless him he’s no longer with us, but that was part of the whole Spacefest experience if you will. So Griffith observatory, JPL, Spacefest, Mt. Palomar, I did all of this in the span of three days, three and a half I believe. And then I got on the plane and came back home.
So, it just so turns out, as good as that was you might think it may never happen again but I think they’re having another Spacefest next year in Tucson next summer.
I’m not sure of the exact dates, again I’m not trying to advertise the event per say but I believe you might be surprised at just how special the experience will be if you go.
Until next time this is Chuck wishing you many star filled nights.
End of podcast:
365 Days of Astronomy
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