EAST COAST STARGAZING

Photographer David Hoskin of Halifax focuses his attention—and his camera—on the heavens

I have always been intrigued by the night sky. As a youth, I would often lie on the lawn in the cool summer darkness and, with an inexpensive pair of binoculars, explore the cosmos. Majestic lunar craters, Jupiter’s Galilean moons, swiftly moving satellites and constellations of twinkling stars fed my insatiable appetite for all things space-related. My early fascination with the night sky has remained with me throughout my adult life.

I grew up on a farm outside of Montreal on the edge of Quebec’s Eastern Townships. At that time, light pollution was not the scourge that it is today. Although light from a nearby town, and Montreal further to the west was visible, it was low on the horizon and did not hide the stars. During a visit to the farm this past summer, however, I was appalled at how the Montreal light dome has expanded, washing out nearly all the stars in the entire western night sky. It is no wonder that many urban dwellers are barely able to make out the brighter stars and planets, let alone the constellations, nebulae, galaxies and star clusters that are visible to the human eye from a truly dark site.

I now live in Halifax, just outside of the city core. Despite the city lights, the brighter stars that make up major constellations such as Orion the Hunter, as well as the moon and other planets, are clearly visible from my backyard, although dimmer astronomical objects often pose a challenge. Thankfully, a reasonably dark sky is only a short 30-minute drive away while a longer drive to the Annapolis Valley or Kejimkujik National Park, which is an official Dark Sky Preserve, reveals a pristine dark sky and the Milky Way in all its glory.