Methow Valley News August 14, 2019 LIGHT MATTERS Save Our Night Sky Methow Valley residents today enjoy a influence over our sky conditions. not exist to take away your outdoor lights. magnificently dark night sky filled with Therefore, our sky is naturally dark and On the contrary, the IDA fully understands stars, planets, comets, the moon, and will remain so as long as we don't turn on the role of outdoor lighting, both public myriad other celestial features. When city- too many lights. Think about that. and private, in promoting the safety and dwellers visit, they often comment on the welfare of a community. What the IDA beautiful sweep of the Milky Way, the Growing 'dome of light' asks is that everyone please use outdoor colorful glow of the Aurora Borealis, and The dome of light already visible over lighting (1) where it is needed, (2) when it the annual sparkling the downtown core area of Winthrop is needed, and (3) with an intensity and showers of meteors. grows every year. Satellite images color suitable for the task at hand. Visitors comment on the from the VIIRS radiometer installed On another point, the IDA does not exist sky here because they on the NASA Joint Polar Satellite to bankrupt poor homeowners by forcing cannot see the same System reveal that light emanating them to buy better porch lights. Most new features in their own home from the Winthrop area increases at Dark Sky communities grant as much as 10 towns. Profligate and a rate of approximately seven years for individual home owners to bring inappropriate use of percent annually, which amounts to a lights into compliance and strongly exterior lighting has doubling every ten years. At that encourage philanthropic organizations to rendered their night skies rate, in only 50 years, the dome of help indigent homeowners comply. un-viewable. light over Winthrop will have I believe that Dark Sky issues are both I say profligate because obliterated most of the stars in the timely and appropriate for our region to the number of outdoor Howard Johnson sky, just like what has already consider. I suggest that the communities of lights in use worldwide happened in Wenatchee and Seattle. Winthrop, Twisp, and Mazama join in an increases rapidly every year at a pace much People living in Winthrop will no longer effort to study the Dark Sky Community faster than the growth of population. As see a velvety deep, dark universe, only a program, both benefits and costs, and people become more affluent, and as the dim, uniform glow. Eventually, memories decide whether to proceed towards cost of LED lighting comes down, more of the dark sky will fade, leaving behind obtaining Dark Sky Community and more outdoor lights are installed, nothing but textbook descriptions of how designations for all three. With that lighting up driveways, walkways, parks, the sky used to be. accomplished, those communities could and streets. In a modern city, very few Fortunately, a town like Winthrop can then extend their reach across the entire spaces are left naturally dark. protect its night sky through a combination Western half of Okanogan County to I say inappropriate because most of lighting ordinances, a commitment to create a Dark Sky Reserve, perhaps the outdoor lights installed today have no hood community education, and a little largest in the United States, permanently or shield to prevent light escaping upward philanthropy, but let me warn you that only protecting and preserving the night sky into the sky. All the light that escapes a handful of towns in the entire United over the entire Methow Valley region. upward from a city scatters off dust and States have managed to do so. These towns What do you think about light? If you humidity in the atmosphere, creating a are known as Dark Sky Communities. have opinions or questions concerning "dome" of light over the entire city. Flagstaff, Arizona was the first. There are lights, lighting, the sky, or anything else, Against the background of this glowing fifteen others. We can become one of that please email: editor@methownews.com dome, fainter stars cannot compete. A new elite group. The International Dark Sky study by National Geographic Association (IDA) stands ready to help us. Howard Johnson, noted author and (news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/06/m The IDA, founded in 1988, is a technologist, lives south of Winthrop. He ilky-way-space-science) estimates that recognized authority on light pollution and helped found the Methow Dark Sky 80% of Americans now live in cities the leading organization combating light Coalition, which seeks to preserve and encapsulated by domes of light so bright pollution worldwide. The mission of the protect the nighttime environment of the that the Milky Way is no longer visible. IDA is simple: "To preserve and protect Methow Valley. This is the first of several The intensely dark night sky over the the nighttime environment and our heritage comumns he will write about the topic. Methow Valley is an accident of of dark skies through environmentally geography. The nearest large cities, responsible outdoor lighting." specifically Seattle, Spokane, and Before saying anything else about this Vancouver B.C., each being roughly 150 group, let me point out that the IDA does miles away, are too distant to exert much
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