National Dark Sky Week Starts Tomorrow

This year’s National Dark Sky Week begins tomorrow and lasts until April 4th.  The idea behind this is to simply raise awareness:

How will National Dark-Sky Week reduce light pollution, given that it only lasts a week and not everyone in the country will participate? The main goal of NDSW is to raise awareness about the harmful effects of light pollution. It is not possible for all of the light pollution in this region of the world to disappear. However, it is possible to make a small difference in the quality of the night sky and inspire us all to preserve the beauty of the sky. Another main goal of this event is to promote the use of better lighting systems that direct light toward the ground where it should be and not up into the sky. (Web Page)

While you should always be doing this, at least for the coming week, turn off some lights. I mean, come on, this is ridiculous:

The Earth at Night

This year’s Dark Sky Week also coincides with Earth Hour, a time when people all over the globe turn off lights for one hour.  It is scheduled for March 29th, 8pm, your local time.

Kelly Beatty over at Sky and Telescope has a great post on this.