International Observe the Moon Night, 2022

Intrenational Observe the Moon Night is an worldwide event supported by NASA. This event occurs annually in September or October, when the Moon is around first quarter. This year the date was fixed to be 1^st October, 2022. Sky Watchers’ Association is organising this event for past few years. Though during the pandemic situation the last two years the entire program was done online, but this year they do organise a public observation program celebrating this event. Since 1^st of October was ‘sasthi’ of Durga Puja, the organizers, with all consent from NASA, arranged the event on 31^st October at the Dakshinapan Shopping Complex at Dhakuaria. Five telescopes was deployed to conduct the observation program alongwith posters and flexes describing various facts about our only natural satellite. The added attraction was the glimpse of two giants of our solar system through telescopes – Jupiter and Saturn, that can be seen in the evening sky for now. Though the observation was scheduled to kick-off at 5 pm, queues started to build up well before time. All the telescopes were pointed towards the Moon and people of all ages were enjoying the beauty of the cresent moon. Many of them also clicked an image through telescope. The excitement picked up as Jupiter came into view. Children with their parents were amazed to observe the largest planet of the solar system with its four Galelian moons – Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. Then came the turn of the show-stopper – the Saturn. It seemed a never-ending queue as people were repeatedly observing the ringed beauty. They were also able to observe one satellite of Saturn – Titan. On the other hand, crosswords were set up and many enthusiastic little faces were seen searching for answers. In between the observation livge demonstration was going on where it was explained that why we see only one face of the moon all the time. The demonstration was given by the president of the Sky Watchers’ Association Shri Basudev Bhattacharya. As the long queue waited, the identification of few stars like Vega, Deneb, Altair (which make the Summer Triangle) continued. There were students from many schools and they were overjoyed by the telescopic views of those celstial jems. Their curious questions were answered by the members of SWA. The event saw more than five hundered people gathered to observe the moon. Infact, the view of the Galelian moons and Titan had literally justified the title of the event.