2014 IOTA Conference

1. 2014 IOTA Conference IOTA Annual Meeting July 12 - 14 University of Maryland Observatory College Park, Maryland USA

2. The Importance of Awards • Allows an organization to state clearly what it values in its members • Recognizes the significant contributions made by Members • Permits us to honor those we admire and whom we wish to emulate • Provides a permanent record of the significant work done by those we have sought to honor

3. IOTA Awards Presentation2014 Homer F. DaBoll Award And David E. Laird Award

4. Background DaBoll Award To recognize significant contributions tooccultation science and to the work of the IOTA • Name honors Homer F. DaBoll (1920 – 1990) • Organizer of grazing occultation expeditions in Midwest USA beginning in late 1960s • Suggested the name “International Occultation Timing Association” • Founding officer of IOTA 1975 (secretary/treasurer) • First editor of Occultation Newsletter, from 1974 through 1990

5. Previous AwardeesHomer F. DaBoll Award • 2007 Dave Herald, Australia • 2008 Edwin Goffin, Belgium • 2009 Steve Preston, USA • 2010 Hristo Pavlov, Australia • 2011 Scotty Degenhardt, USA • 2012 Kazuhisa Miyashita, Japan • 2013 Graham L. Blow, New Zealand

6. Background, Laird Award To recognize those who, more than 15 years ago, made significant contributions to occultation science and to the work of the IOTA • Name honors David E. Laird (1931 – 1968) • Physics teacher in Cincinnati, Ohio • Organizer of grazing occultation expeditions in Midwest USA beginning in early 1960s • Published articles “Have Telescope: Will Travel” Oct 1966 • Confirmed existence of a giant impact basin on the Lunar far side • Suffered from Leukemia and died in 1968 at age 37

7. Previous AwardeesDavid E. Laird Award • 2013 Harold R. Povenmire, USA

8. 2014 Award Selection • Nominations were solicited June 4, 2014 • Participating award committee members were • Dave Herald, NSW, Australia (recipient 2007 award) • Edwin Goffin, Belgium (recipient 2008 award) • Steve Preston, USA (recipient 2009 award) • Hristo Pavlov, Australia (recipient 2010 award) • Kazuhisa Miyashita, Japan (recipient 2012 award) • Graham Blow, New Zealnd (recipeint 2013 award) • Colin Haig, Ontario, Canada • Terrence Redding, Florida, USA (chairman) • Award committee goals: • select recipient of 2014 DaBoll and Laird awards

9. Who is eligible for an award? Anyone who has made significant contribution to occultation science or the work of the IOTA Excluding sitting IOTA officers & award committee IOTA membership not required Who can make Nominations? No defined restrictions at this time “Call for Nominations” made via Yahoo group effectively restricts nominators to active occultation community Encourage wide distribution of call Eligibility (current)

10. Deliberations • Total of 18 nominations received. 5 individuals for the DaBoll and 3 individuals for the Laird. 2 were ineligible • Some nominees were nominated more than once • All were excellent candidates • All communication conducted by e-mail • private to the committee • independent of IOTA officers, unless a committee member • This year we again made a deliberate effort to encourage others to forward the request for nominations to other lists, mail groups and astronomy related organizations world-wide

11. Deliberations, cont. • Effective nomination – written essay - documentation • Who, what, when, how • Approach was “discussion to reach a consensus” (not “majority voting”), considering: • Documentation provided with nominations • Experience & personal knowledge of the candidate’s contributions. • Members were asked to select their top picks to be considered and discussed. Then, narrow selection to one candidate • The selectees were unanimous at the end of second round for both the DaBoll and Laird Awards

13. Brian Loader

14. Brian Loader Slide retained as a place holder

15. Brian Loader Brian joined the RASNZ Occultation Section in 1980 and immediately adopted a prominent role as a prolific observer of total and grazing occultations. In the same year • He instituted the Jovian Satellite Eclipse programme which he then co-ordinated for more than 20 years. • He promoted and co-ordinated observations of the mutual events of the Galilean satellites across multiple seasons. • He initiated and continues to co-ordinate the double star programme for the determination of true separations and PAs from geographically separate occultation observations. Observers from around the globe contribute to this programme, which has resulted in a string of publications, including a number in the JDSO.

16. Brian Loader, cont. Brian continues to be one of the top observers of lunar occultations worldwide, as he has been for the observation of minor planet occultations within the Australasian region since predictions first became available. • (2010) Brian reported on 46 events • John Talbot noted, Brian has also been a regional co-ordinator and reducer for total occultations for many years, a role which has required him to interact with and provide advice to almost every new observer in this part of the world • Together with his wife Pauline, Brian has for many years prepared and published annual summaries of upcoming bright total and grazing occultations for all of Australasia. These have materially assisted in attracting new observers to these events. Comments by Graham Blow

18. Gordon E. Taylor

19. Gordon E. Taylor • Is the father of asteroidal occultations, predicting these events since the early 1950’s and thereby securing the first definite observation of such an event • In the mid-1970’s, he spearheaded the effort to expand the predictions of additional asteroids as ephemerides improved, and better star catalogs became available. • He was the first to use special astrometric observations to improve the predictions of events, a technique which proved to be crucial before the release of HIPPARCOS data in 1997. • He worked closely with IOTA for many of the first asteroidal occultations we tried, such as the occultation of gamma Ceti A by (6) Hebe on 1977 March 5 that resulted in Paul Maley’s observation of a secondary occultation, largely responsible for starting IOTA’s claims that some asteroids likely have satellites. Besides occultations by minor planets, Gordon also predicted occultations by major planets, notably the occultation of Regulus by Venus on 1959 July 7, and the occultation of beta Scorpii by Jupiter (and Io) on 1971 May 14. Gordon also worked in the Her Majesty’s Nautical Almanac Office (HMNAO) at the Royal Greenwich Observatory, where he also was instrumental in the programming for lunar occultation predictions and reductions, as noted by Alex Pratt in his article about the occultation machines in the latest issue of JOA. He was the longest-serving Director of the Computing Section of the British Astronomical Society from 1974 to 2009. David Dunham

20. Gordon E. Taylor, cont. • Besides occultations by minor planets, Gordon also predicted occultations by major planets, notably the occultation of Regulus by Venus on 1959 July 7, and the occultation of beta Scorpii by Jupiter (and Io) on 1971 May 14. • Gordon also worked in the Her Majesty’s Nautical Almanac Office (HMNAO) at the Royal Greenwich Observatory, where he also was instrumental in the programming for lunar occultation predictions and reductions, as noted by Alex Pratt in his article about the occultation machines in the latest issue of JOA. • He was the longest-serving Director of the Computing Section of the British Astronomical Society from 1974 to 2009. Comments by David Dunham