Astronomy: Star Parties [Originally posted in 1996]

What are star parties ? In the USA, where astronomy is popular, Star Parties are held on the annual basis or when a major celestial event is due to occur.

Annual or regular Star Parties normally held to observe :

• Messier Objects
• NGC objects
• Major planets etc

The adhoc parties are to observe major celestial events like

• Jupiter Crash of 1994
• Persid Showers
• Comet Hyakute, 1996 etc

In Penang, there are star-gazing activities held at the USM every Friday and supervised by Dr. Chong Hon Yew.

I used to join Dr. Chong on a very infrequent basis at USM. What I am really interested is to gather a group of enthuasitic star-gazers to join me to obseve major celestial events.

The latest event which I observed was the Great Comet Hyakute at Telok Bahang on March 25, 1996 together with CCH Web's Webmaster, Choong En Tet and my brother-in-lay Francis Phoon.