Past Events from 2024

For photos of all past events, see our Flickr Page. For lecture recordings, see our YouTube Page.

To learn more about each event this year (including abstracts, titles, etc.), click on the event links below.

Friday, January 12, 8-10PM

Lecture and Stargazing - Supernovae: The Brilliant Endings of Massive Stars
Lecturer: Michael Pajkos
Lecture Captain: Cameron Hummels
Lecture Volunteers (2+): Dee Dunne, Nicholas Rui
Telescope Captain: Andreas Faisst
Telescope Volunteers (4): Sam Rose, Xander Hall, Soumyadeep Bhattacharjee
Attendees: 180
120 in-person + 60 online = 180 attendees. Really great event last night with good weather, an excellent
presentation, and a lively panel and audience. No technical difficulties this month after some issues in
December, and we had so many intriguing questions from the audience that we struggled to get through all
of them in time! A good problem to have. Jupiter, M42, and M33 were targets.

Tuesday, January 16, 5:30-7PM

Telescope Training on Dobs and eVscope
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Participants: Javier Roulet, Ed Nathan, Eliot Finch, Marco Crisostomi
Good group. We got through setting up and taking down 6" dob; viewing Moon and Jupiter.
Also setup and takedown of eVscope with a view of M42.

Saturday, January 27, 5:00-7:00PM

Astronomy Night at Kester Avenue Elementary
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers (1-2): Ashish Mahabal
Attendees: 400
Elementary school in Thousand Oaks hosted an astronomy night for their 800 students. Ashish went out
and answered questions for a few hours at the Ask an Astrophysicist table. It sounds like the event went
really well overall. Clear weather for stargazing with the Burbank Sidewalk Astronomers.

Monday, January 29, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Dog Haus
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Kaustav Das, Niyati Desai
Volunteer (3+): Sam Rose, Nicholas Rui, Jean Somalwar, Nik Prusinski
Attendees: 250
Great event with two great presentations and a good turnout. eVscope provided views of M1 and M42.
Lots of engagement by the audience and several compliments from attendees afterwards. Warm weather
and no event for 7 weeks may have contributed to the great turnout.

Friday, February 16, 8-10PM

Stargazing Lecture - Chasing the Solar Atmosphere using Eclipses and the Parker Solar Probe
Lecturer: Gabe Muro
Lecture Captain: Cameron Hummels
Lecture Volunteers (2+): Ivey Davis, Robin Wen
Telescope Captain: Sam Rose
Telescope Volunteers (4): Xander Hall, Kira Nolan
Attendees: 130
90 in-person + 40 online = 130 attendees. Solid presentation and good audience engagement tonight.
The weather was hazy with a few clouds, so moon and Jupiter were the only possible observations.
The telescopes got some dew on the mirrors, but it should be OK. Lots of discussion during the Q&A
of the eclipse, the Carrington Event, as well as dark matter. Good event.

Thursday, February 22, 5:30-7:30PM

Telescopes with Annandale Elementary School
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers (1-2): Adolfo Carvalho, Xander Hall
Attendees:75
We hosted the Annandale Elementary School's telescope night with two telescopes. It's a public school of about
100 students in grades K-5 in Highland Park. and they were very excited to welcome us. The event was quite early
in the evening, and we only had views of the full Moon for the first 15 minutes. Then we were able to view Jupiter and
finally the Orion Nebula using the eVscope2. We also brought HST lithographs, solar eclipse glasses, NASA stickers,
and Caltech Astro business cards to hand out to families. Pretty good overall.

Friday, February 23, 5:30-7:30PM

Telescopes with San Rafael Elementary Science Fair
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers (1-2): Kira Nolan
Attendees: 150
We joined local school San Rafael Elementary for their event which was part science fair, part black history month celebration.
There were a number of outdoor activities for the kids to do, including our telescope set up, as well as indoor activities with
entries in the science fair, a Ghanaian drumming demonstration, an art demonstration and more. At our station, we had views
of Jupiter and the Orion Nebula, and at the very end of the night the Moon rose high enough that we could observe it.
Lots of enthusiastic children, but we were a little too close to the air-powered rocket demonstration and rockets kept coming
down on our group. If we do it again, it might be good to move.

Tuesday, February 27, 6:00-8:00PM

CANCELLED: Telescopes with Marshall Middle School Science Fair
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers (1-2): Sam Rose
Attendees: 0
Weather was overcast and no chance of observing, so we bailed.

Monday, February 26, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Dog Haus
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Zach Weinersmith, Maria Camarca
Volunteer (3+): Harshda Saxena, Xander Hall, Jean Somalwar
Attendees: 250
Awesome event despite some initial setbacks. Wet weather was forecasted for Monday's event, and because our venue
is outdoors, I made the call on Saturday and rescheduled it for Wednesday. This is our first time rescheduling, and I wasn't
sure what to expect, but we seemed to get the word out successfully through social media and the calendar, and we had
a great turnout of 250. The talks were both really good, and people seemed to enjoy it all. Clear skies with views of M42 and M1.
Lots of positive feedback from attendees.

Thursday, February 29, 5:30-7:30PM

CANCELLED: Telescopes with Mayor at State of the City event
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers (1-2): Sam Rose, Max Goldberg, Adolfo Carvalho
Attendees:
Weather was cloudy so we ended up canceling the event.

Friday-Sunday, March 1-3

Death Valley NP Dark Sky Festival
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers: Kathryn Plant, Phil Jahelka, Sam Rose, Joanna Piotrowska-Karpov, Platon Karpov, Nils Vu, Kira Nolan, Harshda Saxena, Kaustav Das, Xander Hall, Aniket Sanghi, Qicheng Zhang, Nicholas Rui
Attendees: 7000
High winds throughout, which required some changes to the plan. All outdoor activities (including star party) were canceled for Friday and Saturday.
This included canceling our camping plans, due to concern with torn tents in the 30 MPH consistent winds with gusts to 50+ MPH. DVNP allowed
some of us to sleep in a storage room in the visitor's center, which wasn't ideal but better than the alternatives. Our activities went well overall, with
two at-capacity Astro on Tap events (130 and 165), lots of engagement with our "Build a Comet" and solar observing demos, a good turnout for Cameron's
"Space Exploration" Lecture, and some great questions for our Astrophysicist Q&A Panel. But our group (and the public) remained in good spirits, and
lots of science communication was had.

Friday-Sunday, March 8-10

Great Orion Dark Sky Festival
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers: Gabe Muro
Attendees: 200
Cameron got COVID from the previous week's Death Valley Dark Sky Festival, so he was unable to participate. Gabe gave three presentations
over the course of the weekend with lots of engagement with attendees on the topics of stellar evolution, heliophysics, and the eclipse.

Friday, March 15, 8-10PM

Stargazing Lecture - SPHEREx: Zooming Out to See the Big Picture
Lecturer: Jamie Bock
Lecture Captain: Cameron Hummels
Lecture Volunteers (2+): Harshda Saxena, Sam Ponnada
Telescope Captain: Sam Rose
Telescope Volunteers (4): Robin Wen
Attendees: 200
120 in-person + 80 online = 200 attendees. Great turnout despite some cloudy weather. People were very excited
about Jamie's talk topic. Lots of great questions from the audience and lots of engagement. We had some
technical difficulties in that the Hameetman projector system didn't work at all. Starting it up, it just displayed
"No Stream Detected" error. Neither Jamie nor I could fix it through troubleshooting over 20 minutes. Fortunately,
I had a cheap portable projector in my office that I was able to rig up to work, but it was not very powerful, bright, and
wasn't able to fully focus, so it wasn't great. But at least it was something. Very embarrassing for this to happen,
especially during a professor's presentation. We really need to have a reliable projector system in Cahill for these events.
It turns out that the issue was with the encoder that broadcasts the stream from the lectern to the projector itself.
In speaking with Chris Mach, this recently purchased encoder has had issues in that it needs to be rebooted every
few weeks, and I guess it must have gone out in the day or so prior to our event. The encoder died completely, and
they will be replacing it, so hopefully this won't cause problems in the future.

Saturday, March 16

PUSD Science Festival
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers for 11:30-2:30 slot (2-4): Ivey Davis, Soumyadeep Bhattacharjee
Volunteers for 2:30-5:30 slot (2-4): Yuping Huang
Attendees: 1000
We made due on a small staff for this one. Last year we had the build-a-comet demo, solar marshmallow
demo, and lots of solar telescopes and such. This year, due to the small number of volunteers, we just
had a few solar telescopes set up and handed out eclipse glasses in advance of the solar eclipse this year.
It still went reasonably well overall, despite having some cloudy weather for about an hour near the end.
But audience members were in good spirits and we had some solid engagement with local families.

Saturday, March 23

Stargazing at the Langham Hotel
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers: Carlos Ayala, Yoonsoo Kim
Attendees: 40
It was an unusual event, but we made it work. The Langham Hotel is a very expensive hotel located a few miles from
Caltech in San Marino. It used to be a Ritz Carlton, which gives you the idea of its wealth and clientele. We were approached
to host an event there with telescopes, and I acquiesced with the caveat that they would pay us an honorarium which could be
used towards our outreach budget, since I receive virtually no funding or support from Caltech for the outreach expenses for
equipment and supplies. Originally, we agreed to hosting two telescopes and two astronomers for two hours for Earth Hour for $500.
The plan was to bring a projector and project a view of the telescope on to the projector for all to see while they were enjoying
drinks. However, the forecast prior to this event was for clouds and rain, so we pivoted to an indoor plan with a slideshow of astronomical
images to be played on the screen while our astronomers walked amongst the crowd and answered questions on the objects being shown.
In the end, the weather was clear (becoming cloudy), so we were able to set up the telescopes and the projector of astronomical objects
slideshow as a sort of hybrid of the two. By the end of the night, it got quite cloudy, preventing us from further astronomical viewing, but
many engaging astronomical discussions were had. We also brought eclipse glasses, HST lithographs, and NASA stickers for the guests.
Improvements for next time might be to have heat lamps outside.

Monday, March 25, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Dog Haus
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Ed Nathan, Nadine Hassan
Volunteer (3+): Ivey Davis, Delina Levine, Harshda Saxena, Xander Hall
Attendees: 200
Good turnout for some great talks and pub trivia. An enthusiastic crowd joined us despite a cool evening with some high cirrus.
We were still able to see a few objects despite the patchy cirrus, including M82 and M44. The presentations were well done and
well received. No live music this time from Jason and Forrest, but the event was fine without it. A journalist was present from
LA Thrillist covering the event, and she got some great photographs. Lots of enthusiasm for the upcoming eclipse!

Monday, April 8

Total Solar Eclipse in Piedras Negras, Mexico
Organizer: Cameron Hummels & Rocio Kiman
Volunteers: Dee Dunne, Harshda Saxena, Javier Roulet, Carlos Ayala, Delina Levine, Aniket Sanghi, Hazel Yun, Mike Kelzenberg, Charles Sommer, Freeke van de Voort, Tim Davis, Vadim Semenov
Attendees: 2000
An ambitious undertaking but a great success. Four vehicles drove 12 of us out from Pasadena to Piedras Negras, Mexico over several days (20h drive time minimum) to
host two days of activities for the community of Piedras Negras. We had 4h of day time activities the day preceding the eclipse, including solar telescopes, scientific presentations
handing out eclipse glasses, and science demos (400 attendees). That evening, we hosted a star party for 2h with 4 telescopes, showcasing views of Jupiter, M42, M45, M51, M81, M82, and M3 (800 attendees).
Finally, on Monday, we had 3h of events for the eclipse itself (1000 attendees), with solar telescopes, eclipse glasses, and live-streaming a view of the Sun to a big screen as well as online (20k views).
We were partnering with the Institute of Technology of Piedras Negras, who were able to host us and deal with logistics, while we provided the scientific equipment and content. All of the events were live-streamed
to Facebook Live, primarily in Spanish. We had a great time, and all of the participants were very thankful for the activities. The event was covered by several different media outlets around Northern Mexico.
There were no issues with car or health or safety or immigration in getting to/from Mexico, so I call it a great success. In followup discussions, we may limit things in the future to just be grads+postdocs+staff
as well as make very clear guidelines on what people will be expected to contribute and when to be available.

Monday, April 8, 10AM-Noon

Partial Solar Eclipse on Caltech's Campus
Organizer: Cameron Hummels & Katherine de Kleer
Volunteers: Sam Rose, Kenny Lau, Xander Hall, Patrick Shopbell, Kaustav Das, Kira Nolan, Sam Whitebook, Sam Ponnada, Sofia Covarrubias, Robin Wen, Jen Sobeck, Yoonsoo Kim, Jean Somalwar
Attendees: 3000
Huge turnout for our eclipse activities on campus. We had made plans with Caltech Athletics for several months that we would host an event for the eclipse on the north athletic fields. Since the eclipse
was happning mid-morning on a weekday, I only expected 500 or so attendees as I reasoned that people would be in work/school. But we had the capacity for more attendees in case they showed.
We arranged to have the gate at the NE corner of the field open, with greeters at a table to welcome people, ensure they knew the rules of the field, and hand out eclipse glasses. We also had 4 security there.
The turnout was much larger than expected, with 3000 attendees over the course of the morning. Despite our event starting at 10AM, we had people lining up before 8AM, as there were concerns about getting
eclipse glasses. I had left 2000 pairs, and those were gone in the first hour of the event. But we had solar telescopes set up, and collanders as pinhole cameras, so everyone had a great time and hopefully
learned something. There were several media outlets present, including LA Times, ABC News, etc, who interviewed many of our staff and students. Afterwards, our volunteers were able to clear the field, remove
any litter that had been dropped and make sure everything was very clean and tidy before closing up. All in all, a very successful event!

Thursday, April 11, 8-10PM

Stargazing Session in Big Bend NP
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Attendees: 350
In driving back from the total solar eclipse, Cameron stopped in Big Bend NP for a couple of nights. Big Bend is known for having the darkest
skies of any national park in the lower 48 states. Cameron worked with park rangers to offer a night of stargazing with three of the telescopes
he had brought to the eclipse activities (eVscope2, S50, and 10" dob). A great turnout with lots of excited attendees to see young moon, Jupiter,
M51, and M81.

Friday, April 19, 8-10PM

Stargazing Lecture - Cosmic Gold Mining
Lecturer: Shreya Anand
Lecture Captain: Cameron Hummels
Lecture Volunteers (2+): Navin Sridhar
Telescope Captain: Sam Rose
Telescope Volunteers (4): Sam Whitebook, Tim Proudkil
Attendees: 160
125 in-person + 35 online = 160 attendees. Solid talk by Shreya on binary neutron star interactions, followed by stargazing and our Q&A panel.
There were lots of engaging audience members throughout the Q&A. The weather was a bit hazy, so not ideal, but between the SeeStar and the
eVscope, we were able to see quite a bit. Also, the first quarter moon was on full display, which is always nice.

Monday, April 22, 9-11AM

Visit to Cleveland Elementary School
Organizer: David Hale
Attendees: 100
Cleveland Elementary School, in Lakewood, CA. David presented to four classes: two TK (~21 ea) and two K (~30 ea) classes. He set up a solar telescope in the doorway of the classroom, and then discussed what he does as an astronomer, and answered questions for each class. At recess several other older kids (and teachers) caught sight and had their chance to look at the sun and it’s nine sunspot groups.

Saturday, April 27, 12-5PM

Girl Scout Event with GWiPMA
Organizer: Dee Dunne
Attendees: 80
It sounds like the event went well. There were several representatives from different departments performing science demonstrations for the scouts.
Dee operated our H-alpha solar telescope and solar projector telescope with the girls. Dee provided them all with views of the Sun as well as
descriptions of the relevant science to be seen in terms of prominences and sunspots

Monday, April 29, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Dog Haus
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Joe Lazio, Smadar Naoz
Volunteer (3+): Sam Rose, Xander Hall, Tim Proudkii
Attendees: 250
Great event. The presentations were excellent, Jason Achilles and Forrest performed but not too loudly, and the weather was clear so we were able to observe.
Telescopes pointed at M51 and M3. No technical issues and a lot of positive feedback. There were even a lot of merch purchases throughout the night with
people wanting to support these events. And Arjun got the awning fixed up so it's all waterproof. Good times.

Friday, May 10, 8-10PM

Stargazing Lecture - Nova T Coronae Borealis: A New Star in the Crown
Lecturer: Mansi Kasliwal
Lecture Captain: Cameron Hummels
Lecture Volunteers (2+): Kaustav Das, Maria Camarca
Telescope Captain: Andreas Faisst
Telescope Volunteers (4): Sam Rose
Attendees: 140
110 in-person + 30 online = 140 attendees. Great presentation and enthusiastic audience. Weather was clear for first half of night, but
then got cloudy later. Only two people on telescopes, which was a bit limiting. Lively Q&A panel. Also, lots of solar activity led to auroral
showing that night, so had some discussions of magnetospheres.

Saturday, May 11, 12-3PM

Sidewalk Solar Observing in Pasadena
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers: Dee Dunne, Harshda Saxena
Attendees: 250
Perfect timing for solar observing after the major auroral activity the night before. Lots of engagement at our normal location on Colorado
across from Apple Store. Used an H-alpha scope and 6" dob with sun funnel, which worked well. Lots of prominences and sunspots.
Handed out lots of business cards advertising our main events, and we saw an increase in activity on our social media feeds.

Monday, May 20, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Dog Haus
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Kevin Hand, Jean Somalwar
Volunteer (3+): Delina Levine, Dee Dunne, Xander Hall, Tim Proudkii
Attendees: 200
Solid turnout for some great talks. Jason Achilles performed with a new drummer and it worked well. Kevin Hand signed and sold copies
of his new book, which worked well. Too cloudy to observe anything through the telescope, though. Good night.

Thursday, May 30, 5-7PM

STEAM Festival in Ely, NV
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Attendees: 80
Cameron was traveling to Ely, NV to help out with some DSA-2000 related efforts. There was a STEAM festival for the local schools (White Pine School District)
with several science booths set up, so Cameron put together a Caltech Astro table including a solar telescope and lots of astronomy swag (HST + JWST images, bookmarks, etc.).
There were probably 80 people who came by over the course of the evening and lots of great conversations. Also, Cameron made contact with several
local school teachers for continued collaboration. Kara Garcia was the organizer of the overall event.

Thursday, June 6, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Mountain Rambler (Bishop, CA)
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Ruby Byrne, Nivedita Mahesh
Volunteer (3+):
Attendees: 80
Solid event with a good turnout. Ruby and Nivedita both gave good talks, and the weather was cooperative for
operating the telescope (eVscope2). Cameron needed a bit of help to do all of the things, but it worked OK.
Notably, there were some world-famous rock climbers in the audience including Tommy Caldwell.

Monday, June 24, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Dog Haus
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Robert Hurt, Xander Hall
Volunteer (3+): Delina Levine, Isabel Sands, Harshda Saxena
Attendees:230
Great event with good turnout. Excellent talks by Xander and Robert--very polished. A very responsive and
enthusiastic audience. We successfully recorded it too.

Friday, July 12, 8-10PM

Stargazing Lecture - An Odyssey Through the Warped Side of Our Universe
Lecturer: Kip Thorne
Lecture Captain: Cameron Hummels
Q&A Panelists: Katerina Chatziioannou, Elias Most
Video Director: Ivey Davis
YouTube Moderators: Soumyadeep Bhattacharjee, Adolfo Carvalho
Slido Prescreeners: Isabel Sand, Iago Braz Mendes
Invited Guests Admission: Cece Abramson
Telescope Captain: Dee Dunne
Telescope Greeters: Aniket Singh, Delina Levine, Alice Heranval
Telescope Operators:
* Harshda Saxena & Gustav Romare (eVscope2: M57)
* Kira Nolan (SeeStar: M51)
* Evan Nunez & Hazel Yun (Celestron 8": M13)
* Sofia Covarrubias (Dob 6": Moon)
* Kaustav Das (Dob 8": Moon)
* Marco Crisostomi (Dob 10": Moon)
Telescope Roamers: Dee Dunne, Nik Prusinksi, Sam Ponnada, Jakob Faber, Zach Luppen, Yashvardhan Tomar
Attendees: 1210
980 in-person + 230 online = 1210 overall. What an event! We hosted in Beckman Auditorium to a packed audience. Six telescope outside (3 dobs on the first-quarter moon; C8, S50, eVscope2 on M13, M51, and M57).
Some hazy and high cirrus prevented us from viewing M51, but M57 and M13 were possible. Kip gave a tremenous presentation on spacetime, tendices, gravitational waves,
hawking radiation, wormholes, etc. I think the audience was generally very happy with it. Our Q&A panel went well overall, even with some questions dipping into the esoteric
but it was still light and conversational. And the grads really came together to support this in a way we haven't had at any event previously, so I'm deeply humbled and thankful.
A big success overall.

Monday, July 22, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Dog Haus
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Zhuyun Zhuang, Richard Feder
Volunteer (3+): Sam Rose, Harshda Saxena, Delina Levine, Kira Nolan
Attendees: 300
Big turnout for a great event. Zhuyun and Richard each gave solid talks, although they both went a bit long.
Jason Achilles had a very good set with some new music. Enthusiastic crowd. Probably the big turnout was
due to residual interest from Kip's lecture, JPL interns, Mars 10 science meeting in town, and good weather.
I hope it keeps up for future events! Need to order more swag.

Wednesday, July 31 8-10PM

Stargazing Night for HSRC (High School Research @ Caltech
Organizer: Dee Dunne
Volunteers: Sam Rose, Sam Whitebook
Attendees: 15
Dee gave a short galaxy presentation to the students, then provided the 15 students with views through the eVscope2. Clear night
with lots of enthusiastic students and great observing. Overall big success.

Friday, August 16, 8-10PM

Stargazing Lecture - The Gigantic Black Hole in the Center of our Galaxy and the Stars around It
Lecturer: Re'em Sari
Lecture Captain: Cameron Hummels
Lecture Volunteers (4+): Nicholas Rui, Jean Somalwar
Telescope Captain: Sam Rose
Telescope Volunteers (6+): Iago Braz Mendes, Kaustav Das, Marco Crisostomi, Eliot Finch
Attendees:300
220 in-person + 80 online = 300 overall. A packed auditorium for this 101st Stargazing Lecture. I think the success from Kip's lecture
brought more people this month than usual, as we were at capacity in Hameetman. Re'em gave a great presentation on a variety of topics
and the weather was clear for observing. Good discussions on the panel Q&A as well.

Monday, August 19, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Dog Haus
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Nicholas Rui, Catherine Clark
Volunteer (3+): Sam Rose, Delina Levine
Attendees: 200
Slightly lower turnout, potentially from the quick turnaround on the lecture 3-days prior, but still great overall. Good talks
and enthusiastic crowd. Sam and Delina did very well considering it was just the two of them.

Tuesday, September 3, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Mi Chola in Aspen, CO
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Nicole Sanchez, Martin Elvis
Volunteer (3+): Yakov Faerman, Fakhri Zehedy
Attendees: 80
Single event here in Aspen while Cameron is at Aspen Center for Physics. Pretty good turnout despite impromptu event.
40 percent of attendees were physicists or friends, which isn't great, but maybe ok to spread the word on hosting these events.
People really liked the stargazing.

Friday-Saturday, September 6-7

Great Basin NP Astronomy Festival
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers: Rocio Kiman, Javier Roulet, Vikram Ravi, Katie Jameson, Harshda Saxena, Delina Levine, Luke Handley
Attendees: 100
We were invited to host two Astronomy on Tap events at the Great Basin Astronomy Festival this year.
The events were held in the tiny town of Baker, NV at the Bristlecone General Store and Sugar, Salt, and Malt restaurant
(the only two "restaurants" in town). The settings were beautiful, and it was a decent turnout for a town and event so small,
expecially given that it was concurrent with a star party and lecture up the hill. GBNP was able to provide a projector, screen,
and microphone, which worked well enough. The screen was constantly in danger of falling over due to wind, which was not great.
Perhaps next year we could stabilize it better with bungee cords around the base or something? Event really lost steam after the first half
so maybe move it up in time to 7PM instead? Overall pretty good.

Friday-Saturday, September 6-7

Sequoia NP Dark Sky Festival
Organizer: Nivedita Mahesh
Volunteers: Vanessa Bailey, Ivey Davis
Attendees: 200
Contributed talks for Nivedita, Vanessa, and Ivey at Sequoia this year. We didn't have as big a group, since we were split
between Sequoia and Great Basin astronomy festivals. From Nivedita: "The audience was great at my talk- very interactive
and had a few interesting questions. The Key note speaker and address was really interesting. The star party had lesser
telescopes than what was there in the death valley festival last year - but it was fun. Attaching a few pictures from there.
There were some science activity booths during the day and I was fondly remembering our Marshmallows activity!
But Vanessa's Star chart activity was a hit.

Monday, September 16, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Dog Haus
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Rohan Naidu, Ekta Patel
Volunteer (3+): Sam Rose, Adolfo Carvalho, Jessie Miller
Attendees: 275
Great turnout for our visiting Hubble Fellows. The Hubble Fellow symposium is happening this week on campus,
so I invited two of them to be speakers for our Astro on Tap: Rohan Naidu and Ekta Patel. They both gave terrific talks
and the audience was really engaged. After some complaints previously about the rock music being too loud, Jason and
Kevin were able to drop the overall volume, which worked well. The bar only put two bartenders on, so there was a constant
backlog and line of people waiting to get to the bar, such that the line went through the patio for the first hour of the program.
I've asked Arjun to have more bartenders next time. There was also the challenge that the planters on the alley had just been
watered, so there was a wet alley all under the band's equipment and cords and such. Not great. I'll ask the city to water the
plants on a different night. Lastly, we had a deaf audience member attend, which is great, and they requested closed captioning.
Not sure what I can do on that front, but I'll try.

Friday, September 27, 8-10PM

Stargazing Lecture - AI in Astrophysics: How Machines Help Us Learn about the Universe
Lecturer: Joanna Piotrowska-Karpov
Lecture Captain: Cameron Hummels
Lecture Volunteers (2+): Reinier Janssen, Platon Karpov
Telescope Captain: Andreas Faisst
Telescope Volunteers (3+): Kira Nolan, Ed Nathan, Yu-Heng Lin
Attendees: 190
Joanna's presentation was superb, and the audience really enjoyed it. Clear weather led to good observing as well.
Some technical challenges with getting the sound working for the live-stream, initially using the computer microphone
instead of the house sound system as the input for the stream/recording. Also, YouTube didn't begin the stream until
8 minutes into the event for some reason. Not sure what is going on, but Joanna has been gracious enough to
offer to re-record it, so that we can post it online in a better form.

Saturday, September 28, 10AM-2PM

Astro Demos at Explore Caltech Science Fair
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers (2+): Sam Rose, Gabe Muro, Rocio Kiman, Javier Roulet, Maggie Li
Attendees: 500
Super packed event with lots of families coming through non-stop. We had the H-alpha telescope and the SeeStar both
observing the Sun, and we additionally did the marshmallow demo. We went through 5 bags of marshmallows and still
had need for more! Good job, team!

Friday, October 11, 8-10PM

Stargazing Lecture - The Voyager Mission to the Outer Planets and Interstellar Space
Lecturer: Alan Cummings
Lecture Captain: Cameron Hummels
Lecture Volunteers (2+): Harshda Saxena, Gabe Muro
Telescope Captain:Sam Rose
Telescope Volunteers (3+): Delina Levine, Maggie Li, Cheyanne Shariot
Attendees: 250
190 in-person + 60 online = 250 overall. Very entertaining lecture with Alan Cummings. We extended his Q&A by a few minutes
because he had to leave for the Q&A panel. Lots of questions about the recent aurora since it was visible in southern california.
I got Gabe Muro on the panel to assist with aurora questions. Weather was OK, but some cirrus prevented us from seeing much
deep sky objects. First quarter moon and Saturn were visible though, and the eVscope2 could make out the Ring Nebula.

Sunday, October 13, 1-4PM

Carnegie Observatories Open House
Volunteeers: Cameron Hummels, Stella Ocker
Attendees: 700
A few Caltech Astro people assisted with the Carnegie Observatories Open House today. Stella was on "Ask an Astronomer" duties
and Cameron was helping with the H-alpha telescope and solar marshmallow demo. Lots of good turnout and discussion (and volunteers!).
I wish I could get this many people from Caltech to help out at our events!

Friday, October 18, 6-9:30PM

Stargazing for Caltech Reunion Event
Organizer: Cameron Hummels
Volunteers (2+): Natsuko Yamaguchi, Sam Rose
Attendees: 50
Clear weather for this evening's stargazing. We were tasked by the alumni coordinators with bringing two telescopes and
setting up outside of a private dinner featuring JPL Chief Scientist Jonathan Lunine. We brought 8" dob and eVscope2,
looking at Saturn, the Moon, the Ring Nebula, and the Dumbell Nebula. Some comet views too. Unfortunately, they had us there before 6PM
(sunset at 6:15), and we had virtually nothing to do until the dinner let out at 7:45. At that point, though, there were plenty of people
who came by to visit us. Officially we were supposed to be there from 6-8, but we stayed until 9:30 since there were more chances
to interact later. Note to self: don't work with the alumni office in the future.

Sunday, October 20, 12:30-2:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Caltech Reunion
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Dee Dunne, Konstantin Batygin
Volunteer (2+):
Attendees: 80
Another event for the alumni office. We hosted an afternoon Astro on Tap at Dabney Gardens for the reunion. Good food and AV setup in general.
Over the course of the two hours, we had 80 people show up. Great talks by Konstantin and Dee with lots of insightful questions. Mostly an older crowd.
Good performances on the trivia. Some technical problems with the computers/screens, since they'd set us up in direct sunlight. Hard to see the monitors
in the sunlight, but overall a good event.

Monday, October 21, 7:30-9:30PM

Astronomy on Tap @ Dog Haus
MC: Cameron Hummels
Speakers (2): Anastasia Yanchilina, Albert Wandui
Volunteer (3+): Harshda Saxena, Maggie Li, Kyle Hunady, Adolfo Carvalho, Jessie Miller
Attendees: 180
Some technical difficulties with getting the TVs to broadcast from the laptops led to us starting a few minutes late, but then things went smoothly.
Jason's drummer Forrest broke his foot last week, so there was no live music as planned. We were able to record the talks, although the lens
was smeared so the footage is not great. One of the speaker stands broke at one of the hinges, so we'll need to get a new one of those.
Event was OK, though.

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