A night of 1000 stars! On Monday 9th March, Soroptimists Bristol welcomed Jo Richardson FRAS to their supper evening.
Jo is an ex-police officer who, 15 years ago, founded Space Detectives to address the challenges schools face in teaching children properly about space.
Through the European Space Agency, from 2015–2017 Jo worked on several high-profile projects with astronaut Tim Peake, including the Tim Peake Primary Project, the Polar Explorer Project and Mission X. Jo continues to work with Tim to this day.
As if Jo wasn’t busy enough with her teaching and organising events to promote our dark skies, she is also a ranger for Exmoor National Park, Europe’s first International Dark Sky Reserve.
Sadly, due to light pollution being largely uncontrolled, it is getting harder and harder to see the stars. Light pollution affects human health and the nocturnal behaviour of animals and insects. This is a global problem and therefore areas such as Exmoor must be protected.
There is now an additional problem of more and more satellites being launched into Earth’s orbit, reflecting sunlight back to Earth and sometimes obscuring our views, as well as contributing to space junk. This makes the work and dedication of people like Jo, and organisations such as DarkSky UK, even more important in helping to educate and inform us.
Thank you, Jo, for an excellent and inspirational talk.