On any given night in the Sunshine Coast hinterland, small groups of people gather in the dark, eyes turned skyward. Some bring telescopes, others binoculars, and a few are content to simply look up, letting their eyes adjust to the vast expanse above them.
The quiet hum of conversation drifts through the night – talk of constellations, planets and the occasional excited whisper when someone spots Saturn’s rings or a meteor streaking across the sky.
For Ken Wishaw, the magic of the night sky has been a lifelong fascination. But one moment, thousands of kilometres away, cemented for Ken just how powerful the sight of the stars can be.
It was 2016, and the retired Sunshine Coast anaesthetist was enjoying a rafting tour through the Grand Canyon. It was his second trip, and he noted the unusual balance of travellers on both occasions – all but one or two hailed from Florida.
“I realised why as we sat around a campfire,” Ken recalls. “I was talking about astronomy and was asked to point out the stars when a woman said it was the second night of her life she had seen a star.”
The first, she continued, was when she was 35 years old. It was 2am, and Hurricane Katrina had just wreaked devastation in the southern American states. The woman had been driving along the freeway to go and assist her mother when the “orange dome” that encompassed Florida disappeared.
The entire power grid had failed.
“She said that she stopped right there on the freeway and hopped out of her car,” Ken explains. “Everyone stopped and did the same thing. Twenty minutes later, the grid came back up, the orange dome reappeared, and the stars disappeared. All those other people who were from Florida also said they had predominantly come to the Grand Canyon to see the stars. They said the Grand Canyon itself is pretty good, but nothing when compared to seeing the stars. We definitely take stars for granted.”
Ken, who was now deeply aware of how many people never get the chance to gaze at the night sky’s beauty, came home with a renewed passion and thirst for knowledge.
He discovered that 80 per cent of the world’s population live under light-polluted skies. Furthermore, only five per cent of people can see the Milky Way from where they live. Go back 150 years and everyone could see the stars twinkling above.
“I had been thinking about what I could do in retirement that would fill my passion. This answered the question,” Ken tells salt.
And so, he became a warrior against light pollution. Ken, who was Australia’s first full-time helicopter rescue doctor, co-founder of CareFlight and a medevac officer for the Royal Australian Air Force and Australian Army, is not one to shy away from a challenge – or a learning opportunity.
And so, at the age of 62, he enrolled in a post-grad certificate for astronomy through the University of Southern Queensland.
Ken’s interest in the universe stems back to his childhood. In fact, his family has dabbled in astronomy since the 1850s. His ancestors, who lived around the Tamworth region, would gaze at the night sky through a family telescope that has been passed through the generations.
“I remember looking through the telescope when I was nine years old. I still remember my uncle showing me Saturn for the first time.”
It was an experience that Ken carried with him and he went on to join the Brisbane Astronomical Society and discover an interest in space photography. In 2017, Ken helped to establish the Maleny Observatory.
All of this, coupled with his astronomy post-grad certificate, led to Ken co-founding the Australasian Darky Sky Alliance, which advises policymakers on light pollution matters (he was also the recipient of the Dark Sky Defender Award for 2024).
While Ken says the skies above the Coast are “generally pretty good”, his aim is to minimise ongoing issues.
“I was in Brisbane six weeks ago,” he adds. “I had been in Maleny the night before doing a survey and calculated over 2000 visible stars. In Brisbane the following night… with the same weather conditions, I could count seven. Nobody was looking up.
“There is a little trick that the eye plays on us. No matter how light-polluted the sky is, we always see black. It is the way our eyes are designed to adapt.
“But if you take a photograph of it, you will see the pink or orange colours.”
Ken says the Maleny area north into Kenilworth is the last area in coastal southeast Queensland to not fall victim to light pollution. In a bid to prevent our night sky from dulling further, he is now working with Sunshine Coast Council to address the issue. The council has proposed to establish a Sunshine Coast Dark Sky Reserve through the International Dark Sky Places Program. If approved, the reserve will span 873 square kilometres, including Maleny, Mapleton, Montville, Witta, Flaxton and Conondale.
The reserve is an “international designation that recognises places across the world that are committed to preserving and protecting dark sites”. By establishing the reserve, it is hoped to improve our wellbeing, protect wildlife, support astrotourism and encourage responsible lighting.
The process of establishing the reserve presents opportunities for the community to get involved and consider lighting to care for dark skies. Ken says he and the council are working with the state government and Energex to address light pollution issues, introduce better alternatives for street and outdoor lighting (which can save on energy bills) and introduce stronger regulations.
It isn’t an easy task. There are only 230 approved Dark Sky Reserves in the world – six of those within Australia. However, Ken is hopeful the approval will be in place by the end of 2026.
In the meantime, he continues to promote the region’s best stargazing areas.
“We are lucky here in the Southern Hemisphere to be in the centre of the Milky Way, particularly in the winter months – that May to September dry and cloudless period – when the Milky Way is overhead.
“We see satellites and meteor showers regularly. It really depends on the time of the year as to what you can see. From April to June, the Dark Emu is impressive. It is located at the core of the Milky Way, rising in the southeast.”
This Aboriginal astronomical constellation is outlined by dark areas in the sky, which are caused by gas clouds located between Earth and the Milky Way.
Through the year, the emu moves – appearing to be either running or sitting – and provides valuable information to the Indigenous people about when to hunt the animal or collect its eggs.
“May, June and July are the best times to see the Dark Emu,” Ken says. “It extends over half the sky. It’s so big that once you see it, you can’t unsee it.”
The Maleny Observatory, which is based at the Maleny Golf Club, has four large telescopes and hosts public nights from the end of April.
The Maleny Observatory isn’t the only club offering public stargazing.
Out at Yandina, the Wappa Falls Observatory is headed up by Owen Bennedick, a Coast resident with an unmatched love for all things space.
Privately funded and operated, Owen began building the observatory 38 years ago and it operates six-and-a-half days and seven nights a week.
On his 2.1-hectare property, you will discover Owen’s indoor display, as well as 16 telescopes and an endless and impressive supply of knowledge.
Quirky and down-to-earth, he is a man on a mission – to share as much information as he can, particularly with the younger generations. Like many amateur astronomers, Owen’s interest stems from his childhood, a raw story that he openly shares.
“Family wasn’t too good when I was a kid,” he says. “I would grab my dad’s pair of binoculars from the Second World War, go outside into the yard, wait for things to settle down in the house and look at the stars.
“So many dots in the sky. I was seeing all these dots close together and wondering whether they were orbiting each other. My cousins had a telescope they had built out of the chimney of the house and a porthole out of a ship. It was the first time I looked through a telescope. I saw the rings of Saturn and the moons of Jupiter. I would have been 11 or 12 at the time. Life-changing, you could say that.
“My cousin and I dreamt of owning a 25-centimetre telescope. That was as big as they came in those days. Now I own five of those. The biggest one that is functioning is 46 centimetres.”
As for the 80-year-old homemade telescope, it is on display at the Wappa Falls Observatory, along with Owen’s love and passion for the universe. All of his knowledge comes from self-learning through books.
“I still get a buzz every time I look down the big telescope. I still get a kick out of it,” he says. “Where do you start? There are hundreds of things – from watching satellites going over the top of Jupiter and under Jupiter to looking at flares on the sun. You can go out any night and find something new.
“I just want to inspire others and get people to look after their spaceship – our Earth.”
The Wappa Falls Observatory is funded solely by entrance fees. To find out more, visit wappafallsobservatory.com. For Maleny Observatory information, visit facebook.com/SunshineCoastAstronomyQLD/ for more.