Dear Editor,
It can be reasoned that the University of Guyana is not serious about promoting Physics on its grounds due to a glaring oversight in regard to the field of astronomy. Someone or some persons need to upgrade the giant(s) they are standing on.
On Tuesday, September 8, 2015, myself and other individuals with the intention of establishing an astronomy club on campus met as per schedule despite the ongoing construction works. On venturing to the northern side of the physics building in the Faculty of Natural Sciences we noticed the new steel-frame stairway connecting the ground floor to the top floor. There were two of them, one anterior and the other posterior to the building. Disappointingly, however, we could not understand why the planning committee could not have visualised the placement of another tier on top of the taller one for the purpose of astronomy. It would require no changes to the size of the existing foundation or columns because the sum of the live and dead loads during times of astronomy will be less than the sum of those loads during normal use.
Looking at the stars from the ground at UG is difficult. The security and building lights around makes observations (naked eye and instrument enhanced) difficult. The surrounding buildings make it hard to observe the sky. Vehicles traversing along the roads with their headlamps on add insult to injury. To help lessen the problem, we have to get high (no pun intended).
In fact, Editor, there was once a flat wooden section made into the V-roof of the physics building for astronomy. It was on that roof that a Physics student found and tracked Halley’s Comet when it last came in 1985. That was actually the subject of his final year research paper. It was there that residents of Cummings Lodge and others joined Alfred Bhulai on many of his star parties to observe the constellations, the planets with the Rodrigues or Burnham Telescope, and even meteor showers if the timing was right. Sad to say, however, circa 1999-2000, after Mr Bhulai left for his sabbatical, the then dean saw it fit to cover over the roof to site a computer science laboratory there. Height is not a requirement for such a laboratory; it is however a necessity for astronomy when obstacles are in the viewing way.
All in all Editor, I am writing this letter with the hope that the current project co-ordinators of the World Bank Funded University of Guyana Science and Technology Support Project (UGSTSP) can see it fit to have another tier attached to the taller of the two stairways, to give astronomy a breath of fresh air. We are not out of time, it can still be done.
NB Those steel stairways need to have a suitable rubber strip attached to each treader because they can get quite slippery when wet.
Yours faithfully,
Avinand Rampersaud
