When Rebecca Tayler and Richard Wilkin were handed the keys to the Woomera Baker Observatory in 2015, their first question was: “What do we do?”<\/p>\n
The observatory, established by the Department of Defence in 2006, was originally run by a group of local volunteers.<\/p>\n
Being a defence town, many of the volunteers were scientists.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Rebecca Tayler and Richard Wilkin’s knowledge of astronomy has grown since taking over the observatory. (Supplied: Rebecca Tayler)<\/p>\n
A year before receiving the observatory’s keys, Ms Tayler and Mr Wilkin had moved to the outback region to work as surveyors at Olympic Dam, about 87 kilometres from Woomera.<\/p>\n
“It’s a very itinerant town. People come in for a couple of years and leave,” Mr Wilkin said.<\/p>\n
When the couple found out one of their colleagues volunteered at the observatory, they wanted to learn more.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“People forgot that it was even here, and it was down to one guy who would come down and he pretty much just opened it for himself,” Ms Tayler said.<\/p>\n
Richard Wilkin says people tend to come and go from the area frequently. (ABC North and West SA: Viki Ntafillis)<\/p>\n
But a month later, when their colleague decided to move interstate, he handed the reins to Mr Wilkin and Ms Tayler “to do what we wanted with it”.<\/p>\n
“We thought, ‘This is an awesome piece of equipment,'” Ms Tayler said.<\/p>\n
“[So] we went, ‘Well, let’s advertise this’.<\/p>\n
“Let’s get that average person who doesn’t normally get to look through a telescope and make it available to everyone.”Learning one star at a time<\/p>\n
Ms Tayler and Mr Wilkin have now been running the Woomera Observatory as volunteers for 10 years.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Although Ms Tayler said they had some knowledge of star observation through their education as surveyors, they picked up most of their expertise along the way.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Rebecca Tayler and Richard Wilkin have voluntarily run the Woomera Observatory for a decade. (ABC North and West SA: Viki Ntafillis)<\/p>\n
She said they had formed strong relationships with the South Australian Astronomical Society and university experts \u2014 and Googling often helped too.<\/p>\n
“To this day, people come along and ask you a question [and I say], ‘I don’t actually know the answer to that,'” she said.<\/p>\n
“[I] go home, Google it [and] remember it for next week.”<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Rebecca Tayler says she found out about the observatory from a former colleague in 2014. (ABC North and West SA: Viki Ntafillis)<\/p>\n
Mr Wilkin said one cool feature of the observatory was actually found outside the building.<\/p>\n
“We don’t have that much light pollution, but the few street lights that we do have, [the] defence force kindly put switches on them for us, so we can turn off all the lights in our street just by our normal household electrical switch,” he said.<\/p>\n
Turning the street lights out at Woomera Observatory is as easy as flicking a switch. (ABC North and West SA: Viki Ntafillis)<\/p>\n
While there are not too many challenges to running an observatory, lack of sleep is one disadvantage.<\/p>\n
“In the school holidays, we have lots of large tour groups go through with our school groups,” Mr Wilkin said.<\/p>\n
“We hate saying no \u2026 so we’ll open up two or three times on our days off and then \u2026 we work 12 to 14-hour days on our days on.<\/p>\n
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The night sky photographed from the Woomera Baker Observatory. (Supplied: Rebecca Tayler)<\/p>\n
“Sometimes \u2026 we come down here at night, open up for several hours and have to drive the hour back to Roxby [Downs].”<\/p>\n
Mr Wilkin said other than accepting donations for the site’s maintenance, the observatory was open to the public for free.<\/p>\n
“We’ve never taken a cent for it. We love it,” he said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Rebecca Tayler looks through the observatory’s 14-inch Celestron telescope. (ABC North and West SA: Viki Ntafillis)<\/p>\n
Tacos, tequilas and telescopes<\/p>\n
About an hour north, there happens to be another stargazing set-up.<\/p>\n
Conan Fahey and Leila Day run an observatory in opal mining town Andamooka.<\/p>\n
Before COVID, the couple \u2014 who were yet to establish their observatory \u2014 struck up a friendship with Ms Tayler and Mr Wilkin when they would visit the Andamooka pub, where the four of them would “chat about nerdy things like telescopes”.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Conan Fahey and Leila Day run the Andamooka Observatory. (ABC North and West SA: Isabella Kelly)<\/p>\n
But once COVID hit, the local pub closed and, when restrictions lifted, locals and tourists were looking for something to do.<\/p>\n
During “tequila, taco and telescope nights” with other astronomy enthusiasts, the idea occurred to Mr Fahey and Ms Day to establish the Andamooka Observatory.<\/p>\n
“There’s a big community of people that have got their own amateur telescopes of all shapes and sizes, from a few hundred bucks down to several thousand,” he said.<\/p>\n
The Andamooka Observatory was dreamt up during “tacos, tequilas and telescopes” nights with astronomy enthusiasts. (ABC North and West SA: Isabella Kelly)<\/p>\n
Mr Fahey said the neighbouring observatories collaborated by sharing knowledge and referring tourists to each other’s sites.<\/p>\n
Ms Day said the connection offered tourists “two completely different experiences of the night sky”.<\/p>\n
“We like to call it a bit of a star trail,” she said.<\/p>\n
“When we go to Woomera, there’s that beautiful dome there and a really deep space telescope.<\/p>\n