It’s taken a lot of time and planning, but the folks at Tourism Jasper have pulled it off. Bill Nye will be headlining the sixth annual Jasper Dark Sky Festival, which will run from October 14-23.
“We’re always looking at how we can continue to raise the impact that the festival brings,” said Kyle Harms, Tourism Jasper’s managing director. “Obviously having Chris Hadfield here two years in a row brought a lot of notoriety to the event, but having Bill Nye is another way of raising the bar and continuing to elevate that product we have here.”
Nye, best known for his popular educational program, “Bill Nye the Science Guy”, has remained a fixture in the scientific community since his days as television’s favourite teacher. As a scientist, engineer, comedian, author and inventor, Nye has spent most of his life helping people understand and appreciate the science that makes the world work. Among numerous other endeavors, Nye is also CEO of America’s Planetary Society, making him a perfect fit for the Jasper Dark Sky festival.
“Anyone who was born in the 1990s grew up watching Bill Nye, so he’s a great hook for people who might not be so familiar with our dark sky preserve and what Jasper has to offer,” Harms said.
“Bill Nye fits our targeted demographic and we believe this is just what we need to see tremendous growth for the festival.”
This year’s event will feature two separate days with Nye, which includes an adults-only engagement and VIP event on October 14 and a family-friendly afternoon on October 15. The first event has the capacity to hold about 1,000 attendees while the later will be able to welcome around 2,200 people.
“We’re trying to make the festival accessible to as many people as possible,” Harms said. “The adult show is really for that target audience who grew up watching Bill Nye while the next day will allow families to learn a little bit more about science and who Bill Nye is.
“I’m sure he’ll be talking about a lot of different experiences he’s had in his life.”
If snagging Nye wasn’t enough, Tourism Jasper recently announced Star Trek star George Takei will also be participating in this year’s festival, as well as Canadian astronaut Lt. Col. Jeremy R. Hansen. Hansen currently works as CAPCOM, providing the voice between the ground and the International Space Station at NASA’s mission control.
Other events taking place during the festival include various space talks, “Symphony Under the Stars” with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, the annual Beyond the Stars stargazing event at Lake Annette, and the Big Bang Expo. And that’s not all— Harms said Tourism Jasper will be announcing other events and speakers for the festival over the coming months.
According to Tourism Jasper, both of last year’s headlining events—The Sky is Not the Limit with Chris Hadfield and A Night of Mythbusting and Science with former members of the Discovery Channel’s Mythbusters—were sold out with 1,300 people in attendance for each show.
“We’re hoping to build off last year’s success and make this year’s festival bigger and better than ever,” Harms said. “In our minds this is the best dark sky festival in the world.”
Tickets go on sale July 4, with a special pre-sale available July 1 for subscribers of the Tourism Jasper field notes e-newsletter.
Keep checking the 51°µÍř for more information regarding the Jasper Dark Sky festival’s 2016 lineup.
Kayla Byrne
[email protected]
