The lights shine bright in the Arizona night
Grand Canyon National Park’s ‘dark’ status lets visitors enjoy the nighttime sky above
THE GRAND CANYON, ARIZ.— I’m lying in an empty parking lot, metres from the Grand Canyon’s south rim, staring up at the white of the Milky Way, the faint blur of the Andromeda Galaxy and the occasional shooting star.
It’s a sky so bright that I’ve found my way to this particular spot without the need for a flashlight. Such a feat doesn’t sound impressive in a world aglow with artificial lighting, but in the Grand Canyon National Park, that orange fog is blissfully absent.
The park’s provisional status as a Dark Sky Park expires after three years, so the Grand Canyon’s park rangers — or dark rangers, to be precise — are in a race against time to retrofit more than 5,000 lights to be more night-sky friendly.
“There are a lot of lights — to give you an idea of the size of the job, it’s the only national park with a kindergarten-to-12th-grade high school within its limits,” says Rader Lane, a park employee whose job title states that he’s a park ranger by day and a dark ranger by night. “Once it’s done we’ll have the most pristine dark-sky sanctuary in the world.”
Lane’s passion for astronomy was ignited by 19th-century philosopher Thomas Carlyle’s quote, which he repeats for me word-perfectly: “Why did not somebody teach me the constellations, and make me at home in the starry heavens, which are always overhead, and which I don’t half know to this day?”
Born into a military family, he was never in one place for long. “I was constantly (moving) but that quote made me realize I could look up anywhere and see these constellations. That’s a really comforting feeling.”
Carlyle’s words are also a reminder that while the night sky and its millions of stars are always above us, being able to admire them is a different matter entirely. However, it’s not just the clarity which makes this area such a fantastic stargazing spot.
“We’re at the epicentre of a series of southwest cultures with rich connections to the night sky,” Lane explains. “For example, local clans are known to watch for the rising of certain constellations in order to know when to begin seasonal ceremonies.”
Indeed, tribal representatives speak about their links with the dark sky at the park’s various stargazing events. The biggest one is the annual eight-day Star Party in June.
It was also Lane’s advice which led me to the aforementioned parking lot, metres away from the start of the popular Bright Angel hiking trail.
“One factor which makes this area such a fantastic stargazing spot is the altitude — we’re high up, perched on the south rim,” he says. “And that parking lot’s got a great field of view — it’s where we set up our telescopes for the night-sky events. Sometimes the Milky Way’s so bright that it casts your shadow on the ground.”
In Flagstaff, 115 kilometres away, the night sky is held in equally high regard. Flagstaff Area National Monuments has recently been designated a Dark Sky Park, and it’s largely thanks to the efforts of maintenance mechanic supervisor Caleb Waters, who pushed for the designation.
“It’s about far more than just allowing people to see the stars,” insists Waters, a dark-sky devotee who shows me pictures of the homemade down-lighters made from beer cans for the lights outside his house.
“The worst kind of light is bright white LED light,” he says, pulling up photos of street lights covered with insects. “This type doesn’t just cause the most light pollution. It attracts the most insects, which disrupts nature’s cycle, because owls and other birds are also drawn to it, away from their natural habitat.”
Unfortunately, a thick layer of cloud has settled over Flagstaff so our stargazing session is cancelled, but we still stop by the Lowell Observatory to check out the telescope used to discover Pluto in 1930.
It’s enormous, with three, 13-inch lenses. It’s technically an astrographic camera, which worked by reflecting light from celestial objects onto a glass photographic plate. These images were analyzed by something known as a comparator. So you can imagine observatory assistant Clyde Tombaugh was relieved when he finally found the elusive ninth planet.
With our stargazing session cancelled, we raise a toast to Arizona’s dark skies at the aptly named Dark Sky Brewing Company, instead.
There will be other opportunities, and after all, as Carlyle pointed out, it’s not as if those starry heavens are going anywhere soon. Tamara Hinson is a U.K.-based writer. Her trip was sponsored by Flagstaff Convention and Visitors Bureau, which did not review or approve this story.
“Sometimes the Milky Way’s so bright that it casts your shadow on the ground.” RADER LANE PARK RANGER