The March 2018 monthly meeting of Liverpool Astronomical Society for the 2017 – 2018 (136th) session will be held on Friday, March 16th from 19:00 to 21:30.

Our guest speaker for this Friday’s monthly meeting has changed. My apologies for the short notice however ill health has befallen Dr. Katherine Joy and unfortunately she won’t be able to attend. In her place, Mr. Russell Parry has generously agreed to fill the spot and will be speaking for us about the Appley Bridge meteorite.
I know many of you were looking forward to Dr. Joy’s lecture and may be disappointed, however I hope that you will enjoy Mr. Parry’s lecture. I will endeavour to rebook Dr. Joy for a future date.

“The Appley Bridge Meteorite”

One late Tuesday evening in mid-October 1914, residents of Appley Bridge – a village to the north-west of Wigan – were surprised to see a streak of light tearing through the sky, followed by a series of loud explosions. The Great War had recently begun, and if people thought they were under attack, it is understandable. This, however, was no man-made incendiary device – its origin was much further away than Germany.
Russell Parry will tell the tale of the Appley Bridge Meteorite for us this coming Friday.

Our guest speaker this month is Dr. Katherine Joy of the University of Manchester, whose lecture is entitled:

“Space rocks on ice: Hunting for meteorites in Antarctica”

Meteorites shed light on the origin of the Solar System and on the geological history of different planetary bodies. Antarctica is unique collection ground for meteorites – it very cold so preserves them well, the black meteorites are easy to spot against the white ice, and meteorites samples are often concentrated together on the ice along the Transantarctic mountain range. I will outline my experience in travelling to collect meteorites with the US Antarctic Search for Meteorites Programme, and talk about the scientific reasons we go and collect these stones from space.

Katherine Joy obtained her PhD in studies of lunar evolution from University College London in 2007, where she combined data from the European Space Agency’s SMART-1 mission and studies of lunar meteorites. She then held a postdoctoral research position at Birkbeck College where she studied data from the X-ray instrument on the Indian Chandrayaan-1 mission. In 2010 Katherine took up a postdoctoral research post in Houston, Texas where she was based at the Lunar and Planetary Institute and NASA Johnson Space Centre as a NLSI postdoctoral research fellow. She studied samples returned by the Apollo 16 mission in order to study the Moon’s impact record. In 2012 Katherine returned to the UK to work at the University of Manchester where she investigates the bombardment history of the Moon and inner Solar System. She has twice joined the US Antarctic Search for Meteorites (ANSMET) programme, spending two field season’s on the ice collecting meteorites

Subscriptions for 2016-2017 are now overdue and should have been paid by October 1st.
Please contact the Treasurer if you wish to become a member or update your subscription.

Adult Annual Subscription is  £15.00
Junior Members Subscription (10 to 17yrs)  is £5.00

The LAS e-newsletter is now included in your normal subscription cost

Free tea/coffee with light refreshments break will form part of the evening at about 8pm.

Please note – Doors will only open after 6.30pm and not before.

I do hope you can join me and your fellow members, but if you are unable to attend, please indicate your apologies to me by filling out this form.

With best wishes – Ken