A Brief History of the OzSky Star Safaris

The OzSky Star Safari is a unique astronomical observing event with a primary focus (pun intended) on visual astronomy using large, quality telescopes.

OzSky is hosted by a small group of dedicated volunteers from 3RF Australia near Coonabarabran, NSW - The Astronomy Capital of Australia in April with a second annual event being held in the Southern Highlands of NSW near Crookwell in October.

Our primary aim is to provide astronomers from the Northern Hemisphere with a unique opportunity to experience the grandeur of the southern night skies through a number of large, high quality telescopes without the need to transport large telescopes from one side of the world to the other.

The OzSky Star Safari was founded in 1993 by Tony Buckley and Lachlan MacDonald under the name "Operation Pacific Storm" which was a gathering of 12 notable US amateurs travelling to Australia to observe the glorious southern skies. That original event evolved over 25 years, changing names a few times and eventually into the series of events which are now called The OzSky Star Safaris.

May 1993: "Operation Pacific Storm"

In May 1993, a group of keen amateur astronomers from the US descended upon Australian shores, led by none other than the late Ronald L. Ravneberg of Columbus, Ohio who efficiently co-ordinated a dozen "Stormers" on a trip from the USA to Australia.

Local coordination in Australia was handled by Tony Buckley and Lachlan MacDonald, both of whom are still heavily involved in the running of the current events today.

"The Stormers" consisted of a dozen well known personalities such as Ron Ravneberg, Bob Scholtz Sr, Bob Scholtz Jr, David Kriege, Richard Berry, Steve & Sue Rismiller, Thane Bopp, Pete Smitka, John Hall, Ken Spencer and Tom Osypowski.

A number of Aussie amateur astronomers came along to join in the fun and show the folks from the north what a really good night sky was all about. Those Aussies included Tony Buckley, Lachlan MacDonald, Greg Bryant, Monte Wilson, Serge Wadhwa, Chris Mlynarik, Steve Mencinsky and Horst Schuster, plus a few local kangaroos - see photo above!

Accommodation was in very close quarters, with virtually all 20 people sharing two small cabins near the summit of Mount Kaputar in north-western NSW.

Operation Pacific Storm was only made possible by Ron Ravneberg's expert planning and impressive connections amongst the amateur community and he rounded up an impressive group of attendees who were rewarded by three perfect observing nights on the summit of Mt Kaputar before heading further south to Ilford to kick off the inaugural South Pacific Star Party.

That original three-night stint at Mt Kaputar is where the OzSky Star Safari was born, and while it continues to this day under a different name, it faithfully remains true to its original roots of sharing the amazing southern skies with folks from the northern hemisphere.

Telescopes provided for this group included a brand new 20" ƒ/5 Obsession (built on-site from individual components carried across the Pacific by each of the Stormers, a 14" ƒ/7 home-made dob, several 10" ƒ/5.6 home made dobs and various pairs of binoculars for wide-field observing.

The location for this event was Mt Kaputar National Park in north-western NSW, followed by a couple of nights at Ilford in central-western NSW where the group kicked off the inaugural South Pacific Star Party which is hosted by the Astronomical Society of NSW.

1994 to 2003: "Aussie Sky Safaris"

Over the following years, numerous small and medium groups of international observers, including some of those original Pacific Storm folks, made their way to Australia for their annual fix of the southern skies.

Word spread fast through the astronomical community grapevine that there were a couple of Aussies who would happily drop everything and show them around the southern skies for a few nights. The Safaris over these years were completely unstructured and relaxed, but frequent enough that they quickly absorbed much of the accrued vacation time of the two volunteer hosts - not that they minded though, it was a lot of fun!

From around 2000 onwards, as the frequency of those trips continued to increase, it became abundantly clear that it was unsustainable to keep heading out to remote observing locations almost every other month, sometimes for up to a week at a time, so it was decided that semi-organised events would be needed just a few times per year, to try to get everyone coming to Australia at roughly the same time.

Over the next few years we offered suggestions about what we believed were the "best" observing months to folks who were planning astro trips to Oz, and designed these Aussie Sky Safaris to get the random flow of visitors all coming to observe at roughly the same time of year - this successfully brought these trips down to three or four per year, and were usually held in the Southern Fall timeframe of March-April-May and the Southern Spring timeframe of September-October-November.

This consolidation of trips helped to make the Safaris become a far more sustainable undertaking, and turned out to be far less taxing timewise on the two volunteer hosts.

Telescopes provided for these groups included a 20" ƒ/5 Obsession, a 14" ƒ/7 home-made dob, a 12½" ƒ/6 home-made dob, a 10" ƒ/5.6 home-made dob and various pairs of binoculars for wide-field observing.

The locations for these events included such places as Mt Kaputar, Coonabarabran, Ilford, Glen Davis, Mossy Point and the Outback regions of New South Wales, Queensland, Northern Territory, Victoria and South Australia.

April 1999: "Ayers Rock Star Safari"

In April 1999, around thirty keen amateurs made their way to the great land downunder, choosing to base themselves at the iconic Ayers Rock (Uluru) for a week of observing and touring.

In that group were a number of well known personalities such as Tom & Jeannie Clark (Chiefland, Florida), Tom Czarnecki (Southlake, Texas), Lucy McElroy (Southlake, Texas), Tom McGowan (Montgomery, Alabama), Barry Peckham (Honolulu, Hawaii), Jane Houston (Los Angeles, California), Bill & Vicki Janda (Fort Lauderdale, Florida), Bill Williams & son Chad (Chiefland, Florida), Jonathon & Laural Sabin (Ellenton, Florida), Marc & Cecile Salameh (Paris, France), John & Jana Gross (Kitt Peak, Arizona), Tom Miller & his wife, four kids and his Mother-in-Law (Nebraska) and several others.

As a good example of the efforts a group had to make to observe the southern skies, Tony Buckley and Lachlan MacDonald joined this group to look at other ways of running our Aussie Sky Safaris in such a way as to help our northern colleagues make the journey south a much easier undertaking.

At short notice, Tony and Lachlan jumped in a car and left Sydney, hauling a 20" Obsession all the way out to Ayers Rock and set up that telescope ready to help the group find their way around the southern skies.

This turned out to be most fortunate for the group, as we discovered just before arriving that Tom's 24" telescope had been turned around at LAX airport and would not even make it to Australia, let alone all the way out to Ayers Rock.

Telescopes provided for these groups included Tony Buckley’s 20" ƒ/5 Obsession Telescope, plus a number of highly portable LiteBox Telescopes which were transported all the way to Oz by the participants.

On the first night of this trip, an unidentified object was accidentally discovered by Lachlan MacDonald whilst hunting down a familiar planetary nebula in Musca, and was “discovered and reported” as Comet C/1999 H1 (Lee) two weeks later. Oops!

2004 to 2010: "The Deepest South Texas Star Safaris (DSTSS)"

In 2002, we joined forces with Anne Adkins of Texas. With her superb coordination skills we started planning what became an annual pilgrimage of Texans, commencing in June, 2004.

We renamed these events from "Aussie Sky Safaris" to the "Deepest South Texas Star Safaris" - due to the fact that the majority of attendees were either coming from Texas, or being recruited at the Texas Star Party after fighting off uncontrollable urges to observe even deeper south than Texas, to see objects such as Omega Centauri much higher in the southern sky. That event turned out to be very popular and we decided to continue running it on an annual basis.

And so it was, that the name "Deepest South Texas Star Safari" was officially born, with local co-ordination in Australia continuing to be done by Tony Buckley and Lachlan MacDonald, but now with expert coordination and publicity being carried out in the US by none other than Anne Adkins.

We also invited Andrew Murrell and Gary Kopff to join our keen volunteer team to provide additional assistance with the ever increasing numbers of guests. This more formalised annual event became very popular, thanks to the hard work and dedication of Anne who really helped to make these events special, and brought them to a whole new level.

During this period we continued to trial different times of the year for running these Star Safaris, including February (too warm and humid; nights too short), March and April (best months), May and June (cold; too much frost) as well as September, October and November (by special request only).

In early 2006, we joined forces with 3RF (Three Rivers Foundation) of Texas and with their generous assistance were then able to enhance our mutual outreach opportunities and expand participation to a greater number of observers by virtue of a large contingent of first class, sizeable telescopes and other observing equipment provided for use at these Deepest South Texas Star Safaris and other local outreach events. Our arsenal of instruments expanded to include four 18" ƒ/4.5 Obsessions and two 25" ƒ/5 Obsession telescopes.

Following the addition of these new telescopes to our arsenal, we saw a massive spike in the number of people joining us, increasing from an average of 6-12 people per event up to a whopping 37 people (plus volunteers) in 2007. We capped these events at 24 people to ensure the best experience for everyone.

In April 2006 we invited John Bambury to join us as another core member of our dedicated team of volunteers to provide assistance with the ever increasing numbers of guests.

In 2009 our arsenal of available telescopes was further increased to include a pair of 150mm Fujinon Binoculars on a SkyRover Digital StarChair, a 14" ƒ/4.5 SDM, an 18" ƒ/4.2 Ultra Compact Obsession, a 30" ƒ/4.5 SDM, a 12" ƒ/5 binocular telescope and a 22" ƒ/5 binocular telescope.

The location for these events was Timor Country Cottages at Coonabarabran in 2004 through to 2006 followed by the grounds of the Warrumbungles Mountain Motel at Coonabarabran from 2007 onwards.

At first, the volunteers stayed at Timor Country Cottages, keeping the motel available for our travelling guests, but it was quickly discovered that having the core volunteers on-site at the observing site was not only desirable, but essential, so we moved entirely to the Warrumbungles Motel, then using the Timor Country Cottages as overflow accommodation for when the motel was too full.

Unfortunately the Timor Country Cottages were burnt to the ground during an extreme bushfire which ravaged the region in 2013.

July-August 2010: "The OzSky 'Outback' Star Safari"

In 2010, following a special request from the Gove Amateur Astronomy Club, we headed out into the Great Australian Outback with an 18” Ultra Compact Obsession Telescope on board to take astronomy on the road.

With most nights spent camping in various National Parks and similar locations, each night became an impromptu Star Party for the local residents and tourists staying at each campsite along the way. These proved to be highly popular with the campers and locals, with the Green Laser being the “calling card” for when we were ready to start the shows each night.

This OzSky Outback Star Safari culminated in an astronomy outreach event provided for the participants of the famous Garma Festival of Traditional Culture at Gulkula in North East Arnhem Land.

At the Garma Festival, we set up a booth at the festival each day showing passers-by views of the Sun in both white-light and Hydrogen-Alpha wavelengths, also inviting them to return each evening for two shows of observing through the large 18” telescope which had been brought from Sydney. In total, almost 200 people turned up across the two nights to see the show.

Volunteers included Tony Buckley, Lachlan MacDonald, Anne Adkins and Ian MacLean.

Telescopes included:

18” ƒ/4.2 Ultra Compact Obsession;

Volunteers at this event included Tony Buckley, Lachlan MacDonald and John Bambury.

2004 to present: "The OzSky 'Alumni' and 'Southern Spring' Star Safaris"

In the years since commencing the "Deepest South Texas Star Safaris" (DSTSS), there were always a number of folks wanting to observe the southern skies with us during October / November (aka “Southern Spring”).

While we did run a number of these DSTSS "Alumni" Star Safaris on an ad-hoc basis, the numbers of folks actually attending were never as high as they were at the regular Deepest South Texas Star Safaris, however this was due in part to the fact that we did not advertise those events, but rather ran them by special request only.

In 2014, as the OzSky Star Safaris increased in popularity (see next section) the demand for observing at this alternative time of year increased to a level which justified organising and advertising a specific OzSky-style observing week at this alternative time of year.

The September / October / November ("Southern Spring") timeframe offers previous OzSky veterans (and first-timers) the opportunity to observe the opposite half of the southern night skies that that which is available during the "Classic" OzSky Star Safaris.

In addition, these "Alumni" or "Southern Spring" Star Safaris are intended to be a more laid back, relaxed event, with less emphasis on the daily tourism and more emphasis on just observing with friends.

The location for these events can vary from year to year, depending on a number of factors and has been held at a variety of locations including the summit of Mount Kaputar, our usual much-loved observing site at Coonabarabran, however more recently these have been held at a 6,000-acre sheep and cattle station near Crookwell in the NSW Southern Tablelands.

2011 to present: "The OzSky Star Safaris"

The Deepest South Texas Star Safari continued to grow, attracting more and more folks from other part of the US (and around the world).

In 2011, we renamed these events to "The OzSky Star Safaris" to better reflect the expanding demographic of amateur and professional astronomers now attending this extremely popular event on a regular basis.

By this time we had established a worldwide reputation as being one of the best boutique star parties in the world, with numerous mentions in international astronomy magazines, and attracting amateurs from countries such as the United States, Canada, Australia, United Kingdom, Singapore, Malaysia, Sweden, Switzerland, South Korea, Russia and Barbados.

In 2014 we invited James Pierce, Alex Pierce and David Batagol to join our team of dedicated volunteers and increased the number of people able to attend each of these OzSky Star Safaris from 24 people up to 36 people, made possible by the increase in our team of dedicated volunteers, as well as the increased numbers of telescopes now available at these events.

In the preceding years it had been noted that people tended to cluster into small observing groups at these OzSky Star Safaris, often leaving several of the telescopes unused for extended periods of time.

In 2014 and 2015 the significant increase in numbers meant many of those "surplus" telescopes were now being used for much of each night, however there was still some room to enable a few more people to have the opportunity to join us at the OzSky Star Safaris each year, so in 2016 we decided to allow a maximum of 36 “registrations” rather than 36 “people”, meaning couples or friends registering together could all come and still be counted as one.

The location for these events has been the grounds of the Warrumbungles Mountain Motel and Conference Centre at Coonabarabran.

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As these events continue to grow, we continually try to improve them to suit the desires of those attending. We certainly look forward to sharing the next OzSky event with you!

Register Now to secure your place at one of these unique OzSky Star Safaris.

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OzSky "Alumni" Star Safari (read more...)

Can't make it to the next OzSky "Classic" Star Safari in March? Or perhaps you have already been to several OzSky "Classic" Star Safaris and you are now looking for a different time of year to explore the other half of the Southern night skies?

Why not consider the next OzSky "Alumni" Star Safari instead, for your next Southern Skies observing trip!