<x-rich>Fellow dialists:
<fontfamily><param>Times</param><bigger>The press release below
announces the official launch of the EarthDial Project - it's online!
Here's the summary:
Go to
</bigger></fontfamily><bigger><fontfamily><param>Times_New_Roman</param>http://planetary.org/mars/earthdial
</fontfamily><fontfamily><param>Times</param> to see a website that
shows nearly-live views of eleven sundials scattered around the world,
as well as much more information The concept of time and the changing
sun's position over the globe becomes evident in a pioneering way.
Most of the first batch of EarthDials are in the USA, but we also have
very nice ones in Malaysia, Spain, Honduras, and even the South Pole
Research Station (!), but this last one will be losing the sun in about
10 days as six months of darkness sets in. EarthDials have been built
by schools, individuals, and observatories.
Within 2-3 weeks we expect more EarthDials in England, India, and USA
(Utah, Florida, California). But we need more EarthDials, especially
around the world and in the Southern Hemisphere! Circulate this notice
to your far-flung friends and please check our site as to how you can
build your own EarthDial and set up a Webcam - join us soon!
Especially, where is all of Europe?!
Write me if you have any questions or suggestions as to how to spread
the word. Thanks.
- Woody Sullivan
P.S. Check out the websites of the EarthDials in Spain (Valencia)
(beautifully made of tiles!) and Virginia for movies of the gnomon's
shadow over a complete day; also be sure to catch the South Pole
EarthDial (where of course a horizontal dial becomes an equatorial
dial!) before the sun disappears in about two weeks (images can only be
transmitted during the interval ~0100-1700 GMT).
http://www.uv.es/obsast/in/divul/earthdial.html - Valencia EarthDial
website
http://www.uv.es/obsast/es/divul/earthdial/video.jpg - Valencia
EarthDial Webcam
http://www.wsanford.com/webcam/earthdial/ - Virginia EarthDial
http://www.penguincentral.com/EarthDial/ - South Pole EarthDial (today
the shadow falls on a light layer of snow!)
<bold>==========================================================
University of Washington (Seattle, USA) press release
</bold></fontfamily><bold><fontfamily><param>Times_New_Roman</param>March
2, 2004
NOTE: When the Web site launches today, the network of EarthDials will
include ones in Washington, Maryland, Ohio, California, Virginia, New
Jersey, Honduras, Spain, Malaysia and Antarctica. See end of release
for a list.
<bigger>Web site launched today features pioneer EarthDials from around
the globe
</bigger></fontfamily></bold><fontfamily><param>Times_New_Roman</param>Join
a dozen "EarthDialers" starting today at
http://planetary.org/mars/earthdial as the modern marvel of the webcam
merges with the ancient technology for marking time, the sundial.
The EarthDial Project Web site carries a global network of sundials
that, thus far, includes half a dozen in the United States, as well as
ones in Spain, Malaysia, Honduras and even Antarctica. The sundial at
the South Pole, currently basking in sunlight 24 hours a day, will
plunge later this month into six months of darkness.
A project of the Planetary Society, the world's largest space interest
group, Seattle's Bill Nye the Science Guy, and University of Washington
astronomy professor Woody Sullivan, the Web site gives viewers a
palpable sense of what time is on the globe. "As your eye sweeps across
the world map on the screen, you'll see the shadow angles changing just
like the hands on a clock in different time zones," Sullivan says. He
hopes this map will inspire others to set up their own EarthDials in
coming months.
The EarthDial Project coincides with exploration by the Mars rovers
Spirit and Opportunity, each of which carries a sundial calibrated to
Martian solar days (http://redrovergoestomars.org/marsdial/). The motto
"Two Worlds - One Sun" is inscribed on project sundials on both
planets.
Schoolteachers, observatory staff members and amateur astronomers are
among those who responded to a call, first issued last November, to
build sundials to EarthDial Project specifications and set up webcams
with around-the-clock Internet connections to provide images of the
various sundials every 5 to 10 minutes. If a person can't see a shadow
on a particular sundial, then it is probably cloudy. And if the image
on the Web is black, it's probably night.
Each EarthDial is about 32 inches across. The path the sun traces
across the sky differs greatly between the Northern Hemisphere, the
tropics and the Southern Hemisphere, Sullivan says, so each dial has a
pattern appropriate to where it's located. Outside the standardized
main circle, the various sundials include personal touches such as text
in local languages and regional icons.
The first set of EarthDials at http://planetary.org/mars/earthdial
includes:
o One on the roof of a Fairfax County high school in Alexandria, Va.,
that has, as part of its Web site, a sophisticated animation of a
spinning Earth and time-lapse images of the sun's shadow across the
site during the previous 24 hours
(http://www.wsanford.com/webcam/earthdial/composite.html).
o An EarthDial in Antarctica, operated by a researcher at the National
Science Foundation's Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, that is
presently in sunlight 24 hours a day because the Earth's south pole is
tipped toward the sun. Instead of rising and setting, what one sees
each day is the sun making a complete circle around the horizon at a
constant height. Thus the sundial there has markings like a pie with 24
slices. Eventually, as the Earth tips the other way, the sun will
circle down below the horizon, plunging everything into dark for six
months. Visitors should note that webcam images are live only for a
variable 8 hours a day because of satellite coverage.
o A sundial in Valencia, Spain, of hand-inked ceramic tiles mounted on
a stand in a sea-green pond on the grounds of the Astronomical
Observatory of the University of Valencia.
o The project's single dial in Asia, so far, that was built by a
16-year-old student in Penang, Malaysia.
o "ED-1," or EarthDial-One, is the original dial of the project and is
at the Seattle laboratory of Nye, who along with Sullivan and others
devised a way for the Mars rovers to be equipped with MarsDials.
</fontfamily></bigger><fontfamily><param>Times_New_Roman</param>EarthDialers
as of 2 March 2004
Seattle, Wash., USA Bill Nye Labs
Columbia, Md., USA Michael Barnes
Ross, Ohio, USA Karen Conrad
Irvine, Calif., USA Bill Butler
Tegucigalpa, Honduras Maria Cristina Pineda de Carias
Costa Mesa, Calif., USA Marcia Encinas
Alexandria, Va., USA Walter Sanford
Valencia, Spain Fernando Ballesteros
Atco, N.J. USA Robert B. Gamble
Bayan Lepas, Penang, Malaysia Gregory Phoon
South Pole, Antarctica Ethan Dicks
</fontfamily>
******************************************************************
Prof. Woodruff T. Sullivan, III Center for Astrobiology & Early Evolution
Dept. of Astronomy Box 351580
Univ. of Washington tel. 206-543-7773
Seattle, WA 98195 USA fax 206-685-0403
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