ANDAMOOKA, Saturday, 1st April 2023, the Southern Cross Outback Observatories Project (SCOOP) will be visiting Andamooka to conduct a joint public astronomy event with the Andamooka Observatory at the Andamooka campground. SCOOP, PK Imaging, the Andamooka Observatory, Woomera Observatory, Andamooka Opal Fields Tourism Association, and the SA Arid Lands Kingoonya Landscape Group will be hosting outreach astronomy and citizen science events in Woomera and Andamooka. In August 2016, SCOOP held its first sky-watching and public outreach astronomy event in Andamooka. This is SCOOP’s first outreach astronomy run after more than 3 years. The hiatus was mostly due to the uncertain situation during the COVID-19 pandemic, and that SCOOP Director, Dr. Muhammad Akbar Hussain was establishing new space technology start-ups, including getting IPs for Mareekh Dynamics (Engineering solutions for human habitation on Mars) and developing the engineering concept and model for SCOOP (Innovation in space debris detection and mitigation). The safety run for the SCOOP observatory was done in November last year with the highway test to Port Wakefield. The observatory met all the safety parameters and completed the test as expected. SCOOP has been a partner of National Science Week since 2017.
