The Galloway forest has become the first Dark Sky Park in the UK and the fourth in the world, with the other three in the US. The award, presented by the International Dark Sky Association (IDA), recognises the quality of the night sky in the area, where light pollution is minimal. There are few buildings within the park’s perimeter and pitch-black sky at night makes it easy to see distant galaxies such as the Milky Way and Andromeda.
“Such skies are rapidly disappearing and less than 10 per cent of people in the UK can now see the Milky Way from where they live.”
The other three Dark Sky Parks are at the Natural Bridges National Monument in Utah, the Cherry Springs State Park in Pennsylvania and the Geauga Park in Ohio. Galloway Forest Park was established in 1947, covers 300 square miles (185,329 acres) and is the largest of its kind in Britain.Forestry Commission Scotland submitted an application for dark sky status six weeks ago, and the IDA decided it merited the award at its annual general meeting in Phoenix, Arizona, over the weekend. As part of the selection process, the quality of sky above the park was measured using a sky quality meter.
The darkest reading, such as that in a photographer's darkroom, would be 24, while a likely reading in a major city would be 15 or 16. Galloway Forest Park was rated 23. While in a city such as Glasgow one would see 500 stars at the most on a good night, above Galloway Forest Park one could expect to see as many as 7,000. Keith Muir, Forestry Commission Scotland's head of tourism and recreation in Galloway, said: “We have boldly gone where no one in the UK has gone before. I'm so pleased that everyone's support and hard work has paid off.” |
