Dry and cloudless skies might not be good for farmers, but they’re great for astronomers according to Dubbo Observatory owner Peter Starr.
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Just 62.4 millimetres has fallen at the Dubbo Airport AWS so far in 2018; the long-term yearly average is 583.4mm.
Mr Starr said the high percentage of clear nights are not just great for tourists and astro-photographers – it also gives Dubbo a competitive advantage.
He has backed recent calls for the region to form part of Australia’s future space agency.
“It’s got to do with the latitude we’re on; you’ve got the Milky Way passing directly overhead,” Mr Starr said.
“It’s the best view in the world and that’s good for research.”
Last week Australian National University astrophysicist Dr Brad Tucker said the “[Dubbo] region has a stronger argument than Melbourne” to host part of a future space agency.
He said the location of the agency’s headquarters “doesn’t matter”.
“When you think of NASA headquarters you don't think of Washington, where it is. You think of Florida where it launches its rockets, or Houston where mission control is,” Dr Tucker said.
“So how can we work together more coherently on projects? Instead of everyone around the country doing everything, you can become experts at some things.”
Mr Starr said this region’s strength was monitoring satellites (rather than launching them) and stars.
“We do some research on … cataclysmic variable stars, that’s basically what we call a binary star, like a dead star, a white dwarf or a black hole and an ordinary star orbiting around it,” he said.
“That goes to a central database over in the US and countries around the world, astronomers use that information to write papers.
“We also have a set up where we monitor geo-stationary satellites and we do that for an American company, just to make sure they’re in position, not spinning erratically or anything.
“This region is a good place to do that.”