You may be getting up early tomorrow morning to watch the TRANSIT OF VENUS.
The Transit of Venus expedition is one of our challengers on Mission:Explore.
The Transit of Venus expedition is one of our challengers on Mission:Explore.
In 1769, the Royal Society commissioned Captain James Cook to sail around the world to Tahiti to view the Venus Transit and take the measurements needed to calculate the orbital radius of the planet. Captain Cook successfully sailed from Britain, down the coast of Africa, around Cape Horn in South America, and across the Pacific to French Polynesia. He took all the measurements from the transit with his team and sent them back to the Royal Society to do their calculations.
The 2012 transit is only viewable in its entirety from around the same place as Captain Cook sailed to in the 1700’s. Next year, the transit is viewable at its best from in and around the Pacific Ocean.
It will be viewed best this time though from the North Pacific rather than the South.
Modern day adventurer Huw James is assembling a team of people to travel to the North Pacific in the new age boats of the highway! He will lead the team from Britain, across Europe in a convoy of 4x4’s, across the Ukraine, Russia, Mongolia and China to Japan where the entire transit will be visible. Here, the team will take the measurements needed to calculate the distance to Venus and show that scientific exploration is very much still alive today.
We will drive from Britain to the West Pacific to show that Science is not only interesting but the Scientific Process can be a journey of a lifetime, and the reason that Darwin, Cook, Scott went on their epic voyages were to discover more about the world and to bring home scientific facts about the world around them.
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