What? A day devoted to observing the Moon? YES! International Observe the Moon Night, or InOMN, engages the lunar science and education communities, amateur astronomers, space enthusiasts, and the general public in an annual lunar observation campaign that shares the excitement of lunar science and exploration. This year, the event takes place on September 18, 2010. InOMN lead Brooke Hsu of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center tells MyMoon how InOMN began.

InOMN was inspired by people just like you - people who are curious about the Moon and would like to find out more about Earth's nearest neighbor. On August 1, 2009, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) Education and Public Outreach (EPO) team celebrated LRO's successful journey to and orbital insertion around the Moon by hosting a public outreach event called "We're at the Moon!" at Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) in Greenbelt, MD. That same night, the Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) and NASA Lunar Science Institute (NLSI) EPO teams hosted a similar event at Ames Research Center (ARC) in Moffett Field, CA called "National Observe the Moon Night."

The events were so successful, we've decided to do it again. Only better. And much, much bigger. What started at two NASA centers has expanded to events at four partner institutions: GSFC (hosted by the LRO EPO team), ARC (hosted by the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) and the NLSI EPO teams), the Lunar and Planetary Institute (LPI, Houston, TX), and the Lunar Quest EPO Office at Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC, Huntsville, AL). But it's not stopping there. We would like to encourage everyone who is interested in the Moon and sharing the excitement of lunar science and exploration to host their own InOMN event, and bring it to communities around the world.

You can find out more info about InOMN, including a map of event locations, at the InOMN website.

by: Andy S.

Thursday Aug-26-2010