Maui Students Shoot For The Moon

Tonight We will attempt to image the LCROSS impact using the Faulkes Telescope North. Recently students at Kalama Intermediate on Maui created their own LCROSS event.  Assisted by Dr. J. D. Armstrong, on Friday October 2nd students in the astronomy club tested impactors that they had constructed from clay.  the purpose of the investigation was to determine how the shape of the impactor affects the formation of the plume.  Each student made his/her own impactor out of 500 grams of clay, and after drying the impactors were dropped from a the same height into a bin of dried coffee grounds.  Coffee grounds were used because they are lighter than sand or other materials and were available for free at Starbuck’s Coffee.  The plume from each student’s impactor was recorded with a small video camera and a digital SLR camera.  Student’s plan on analyzing the data and hope to be able to see data taken by the Faulkes telescopes at their on their next meeting on October 18th.