Best Astronomy Photos of the Year Named

Photograph courtesy Mark Gee, Royal Observatory Greenwich APOY

A lighthouse beacon stands guard beneath the star-studded Milky Way arching over New Zealand's Cape Palliser coastline, as seen in this overall winning photograph from the Royal Observatory's 2013 Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition.

Australian Marc Geewho also grabbed top prize for the Earth and Space categoryimpressed the judges by capturing a tremendous depth and clarity in this stunning snapshot.

"I love the tranquil combination of sea and sky in this beautiful image, along with the comforting human element of the cliff-top lighthouse," said Marek Kukula, competition judge and Royal Observatory Public Astronomer.

"This view from the shores of New Zealand makes me think of the long voyages the Maori's ancestors made into uncharted oceans, guided by the stars."

Now in its fifth year, the Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition selected winners in seven categories from more than 1,200 entries from 48 countries.

Andrew Fazekas

Published September 22, 2013

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Best Astronomy Photos of the Year Named

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Prison inmates learning aerospace work

AIRWAY HEIGHTS, Wash.

Forget license plates. Some inmates at the Airway Heights Corrections Center are training for jobs in the state's huge aerospace industry.

About a dozen inmates are enrolled in a program that will make them certified aerospace composite technicians. Their goal is a post-prison chance to land jobs at companies like Boeing and its suppliers.

"There is a strong shortage of people to be aerospace composite technicians," said Chad Lewis, a spokesman for the state Department of Corrections.

The idea is that former inmates who have good-paying jobs are much less likely to return to prison, he said. To be sure, the prison system still trains inmates in traditional inmate fields like upholstery and furniture-making.

But there was no good reason to ignore aerospace, Washington's largest manufacturing sector, with jobs scattered across the state. "We wanted to teach offenders something relevant to the local job market," Lewis said.

Taught by instructors from a local community college, the inmates must earn 49 college credits to be certified. They are in class six hours a day, five days a week, and the program takes a year to complete at the medium security prison in this suburb of Spokane. The classes are unique because they offer a combination of book learning and hands-on experience making composite materials. That combination makes abstract concepts easier for students to grasp and retain.

The first class of inmates will graduate in January.

It has been a positive experience for inmate Richard Syers of Spokane, who dropped out of school in the sixth grade but has been earning As and Bs in the new program, which includes rigorous courses like trigonometry.

Syers, 42, hopes to move to western Washington when he is released in 2 1/2 years, and continue training for a job in aerospace. "Everything is composites now," Syers, serving time for sex crimes, said.

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Prison inmates learning aerospace work