🌃 Citizen science in action: the Globe at Night campaign Apr 13–20, 2026 marks 20 years! Just step outside, compare Leo to the star charts and submit your naked-eye limiting magnitude. So far 4,775 reports – goal 20,000. The data maps light pollution worldwide. Join in, it takes minutes.
📅 Apr 13, 2026
🔗 https://globeatnight.org/
Light pollution encroaching on darkness
"The planet’s artificial light increased by a net 16% between 2014 and 2022.The figure is in keeping with a 2017 study that found Earth’s artificially lit outdoor areas grew by 2% annually over the previous five years, and that light pollution encroached on darkness almost everywhere." >>
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/apr/18/earth-brightness-study
#energy #LightPollution #outdoors #wildlife
This legislation, if signed into law by the U.S. President, will have a direct and harmful effect on conditions at a designated International Dark Sky Sanctuary.
The news item: https://apnews.com/article/mining-moratorium-boundary-waters-senate-vote-3e3f0827d52dd6d37f5e554b804ff27c
The legislation: https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-joint-resolution/140
The Sanctuary: https://darksky.org/places/boundary-waters-canoe-area-dark-sky-sanctuary/
The world is watching.
Congressional Republicans are sending President Donald Trump a resolution for his signature that would lift a federal ban on mining near Minnesota's Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. The Senate passed the resolution Thursday. The House approved it on Jan. 21. The push to end the ban comes as a Chilean mining company is looking to open a copper mine in the Superior National Forest on the edge of the wilderness area. Conservationists insist mining would contaminate the pristine watershed. President Joe Biden's administration blocked the project in 2023 by imposing a 20-year moratorium on mining across 400 square miles (103,600 hectares) in the forest.
Northwestern University scientists and physicians are raising concerns about two proposals currently under review by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that could dramatically increase artificial light at night — potentially disrupting sleep, circadian rhythms and seasonal biological cycles.
“Insects are helping everything else work as part of intricate, coevolved systems. You can’t just pull individual organisms from ecosystems and expect everything to keep going,” says Alex Wild, curator of entomology at the University of Texas Biodiversity Collections.
#rewilding #gardening #insects #ecosystems #biodiversity #nativeplants #lightpollution
Losing the Dark - Flat Screen Version
"Starry skies are a vanishing treasure because light pollution is washing away our view of the cosmos. It not only threatens astronomy, it disrupts wildlife, and affects human health. The yellow glows over cities and towns — seen so clearly from space — are testament to the billions spent in wasted energy from lighting up the sky.
"To help raise public awareness of some of the issues pertaining to light pollution, Loch Ness Productions in collaboration with the International #DarkSky Association has created a 6.5-minute 'public service announcement' called Losing the Dark. It introduces and illustrates some of the issues regarding #LightPollution, and suggests three simple actions people can take to help mitigate it.
"Losing the Dark was initially created in fulldome video format for digital planetarium use. It also has been made as a conventional flat screen video, for use in classrooms, kiosks, museum theaters, and advocate multimedia presentations. Classic #planetarium theaters without fulldome capability can show this version using their traditional video projectors."
#PortlandME - At the #USM #Planetarium.
Cycle/Losing the Dark
"Starry skies are a vanishing treasure because light pollution is washing away our view of the cosmos. It not only threatens #astronomy, it disrupts #wildlife, and affects human health. The yellow glows over cities and towns — seen so clearly from space — are testament to the billions spent in wasted energy from lighting up the sky."
Price: $9 - $9.50
Dates:
April 16, 1pm - 2pm
April 17, 1pm - 2pm
April 17, 7pm - 8pm
April 18, 1pm - 2pm
https://usm.maine.edu/calendar-of-events/series/cycle-losing-the-dark/
Saving the Night
A Weekend at Lake Tyrrell | Inside the “Sanctuary” Documentary
I spent a weekend at Lake Tyrrell helping make a documentary about something most people never notice, darkness.
Teaming up with a talented French documentary filmmaker and astrophysicist Dr Kirsten Banks, we filmed Sanctuary, an upcoming international documentary exploring the global movement to protect our remaining dark skies. Under some of Australia’s most pristine southern skies, it became clear just how rare this experience is, and how easily it could disappear.
This isn’t just about astronomy. It’s about preserving a connection to the universe that humanity has shared for thousands of years. Because once the stars are gone, we don’t get them back.
Sometimes, saving the world starts with simply turning off a light.
Look up, question everything.
https://www.instagram.com/astrokirsten/
https://www.tiktok.com/@astrokirsten
https://www.facebook.com/AstroKirsten/
https://astrokirsten.com.au/
#SanctuaryDocumentary #ProtectTheNight #DarkSky #LightPollution #Astronomy #Astrophotography #LakeTyrrell #DarkSkiesAustralia #AstroPuNk #DocumentaryFilm
"A proposed #NewYorkState #law aimed at reducing #lightpollution could create a real problem for the state’s millions of #Jews, particularly on #Shabbos and #YomTov.
The “#DarkSkiesProtectionAct,” introduced in the State Senate by #Senator #BradHoylmanSigal, would require most outdoor lights across #NewYork to shut off between 11 pm and sunrise starting January 1, 2028.
The #legislation covers residential floodlights, building uplighting, commercial spotlights, and billboards, with the goal of preserving dark skies while “promoting safety for people, birds and other wildlife, conserving energy and reducing our carbon footprint.”
https://anash.org/new-york-dark-sky-bill-could-leave-frum-jews-in-the-dark/
Josef Szylar
BellingenNSW
Dr. John Barentine FRAS
Daniel Khent
Rewilding Magazine
DoomsdaysCW
AstroPuNk
דער קערפער פֿון השם
Sara Pritchard