The Great Geordie Space Race

Welcome to the Great Geordie Space Race, which is dedicated to astronomy in the North East of England, and Radio Northumberland's programme of the same name.

This site is owned and operated by amateur astronomer, lecturer and radio presenter David Hughes, who has been active on the local lecture circuit since 2004 and who has delivered somewhere in the range of three hundred public talks on astronomical and science subjects.

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The Great Geordie Space Race

This part of the world has a long and rich astronomical tradition, starting with The Venerable Bede in the 7th Century right up to the present day, where the new space race is already taking shape within this small corner of the United Kingdom.

The Great Geordie Space Race is about celebrating that tradition and about trying to raise awareness of the work done in this part of the world, not just in the time of Bede but more recently, with the work of astronomers such as Espin, Backhouse, Newall, Airy and, of course, the region's Universities, who continue to operate at the cutting edge of astronomical research.

Who we are and what we do:

The Great Geordie Space Race is about communication. We want to get the message out there. We have a very active lecture programme coupled with our radio show, which goes out on Radio Northumberland several times a week. Our activities include:

  • Talking to local history societies about some of the region's astronomers such as Thomas Wright and Jeremiah Dixon.
  • Talking to children's groups, usually Scouts and the Girl Guides
  • Organising observing sessions in our little corner of the North East.


News / Updates

  • 12-Apr-24 : GGSR Next episode



    Apologies but the next episode of The Great Geordie Space Race will be slightly delayed.

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  • 26-Mar-24 : Crook History Society



    Last night's visit to Crook History Society marked the last event in our winter 23/24 lecture programme.

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  • 24-Mar-24 : Astronomy Night (Review)



    An excellent review of the Astronomy Night we put together for The Freemen of Newcastle appeared in the latest edition of the Freemen's Magazine.

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  • 18-Mar-24 : North Tyneside Solar Trail



    I joined the North Tyneside Solar Trail on Sunday 17th March 2024. If you saw a bedraggled man stumbling along Whitley Bay Sands whilst struggling in vain to hold on to an overgown lunatic of a Dalmatian then that was me and Jasper. Thanks to those of you who stopped to say Hello.

    Check out the Blog to read up on our experiences.

  • 12-Mar-24 : GGSR #6 airs



    Episode 6 of The Great Geordie Space Race airs on Radio Northumberland tonight at 2200 hours.

    Topics include a new Comet, North Tyneside Solar Trail, the forthcoming Space Investigators Exhibition at the Great Museum of the North (Hancock) and much, much more...

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  • 26-Feb-24 : Out with the old. In with the new...



    Our old web site, www.david-hughes-astronomy.org.uk is being phased out. We wanted a domain that was more readily associated with the radio show as well as a site that would put us at the top of the various search engines. The old site wasn't able to do that.

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  • 24-Feb-24 : All Change...

    We've decided that a change of plan is necessary.

    The current domain, www.david-hughes-astronomy.org.uk, doesn't appear in a useful position in Google's Search Engine and that's harming our ability to reach our audience. The web site itself takes too long to load and doesn't display properly on mobile devices.

    We're hoping that a new domain will fix the ranking problems and a re-designed web site will fix the display issues.

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