About EarthSky

Hi, I’m Deborah Byrd ... Editor-in-Chief of this website and your geeky sister and friend. You might know me from the award-winning radio series EarthSky: A Clear Voice for Science, which I founded and produced globally from 1991 to 2013. Today, the awesome EarthSky team has a blast bringing you daily updates on your cosmos and world, via this website. We love your photos and your news tips!

Meet Our Amazing Team

Deborah Byrd

Founder and Editor-in-Chief
Deborah Byrd created the EarthSky radio series in 1991 and founded EarthSky.org in 1994. Prior to that, she had worked for the University of Texas McDonald Observatory since 1976, and created and produced their Star Date radio series. Today, she serves as Editor-in-Chief of this website. She has won a galaxy of awards from the broadcasting and science communities, including having an asteroid named 3505 Byrd in her honor. In 2020, she won the Education Prize from the American Astronomical Society, the largest organization of professional astronomers in North America. A science communicator and educator since 1976, Byrd believes in science as a force for good in the world and a vital tool for the 21st century. "Being an EarthSky editor is like hosting a big global party for cool nature-lovers," she says.

Joni Stewart

Chief Financial Officer
Joni Stewart, Chief Financial Officer and Partner. Joni ensures that deadlines are met, that excellence is the standard, and that fiscal responsibility is upheld in all EarthSky projects and products. Since 2008, she has worked with clients and sponsors, as well as outside accountants and auditors, to implement the most up-to-date and accurate production and financial tracking systems available for our company. She also assists independent financial reviewers, providing the information they need to judge that our systems are sound. In 2016, Joni became part-owner of one of the companies that oversees EarthSky online.

David Callejas

Marketing Director
David Callejas, Marketing Director, helps bring EarthSky's content to the world via online ads and other products. He creates strategies that help people around the world find us and appreciate the work we do. He helps manage the EarthSky Store and bring to you the new products that you love. He's the chief liaison between EarthSky.org and the world of commerce. All that, plus he helps post content and populate our pages on Facebook, Google+ and Twitter. Go David!

Brandon McKay

Technical Support
Brandon McKay helps manage the website and the servers that makes everything run. He also handles day-to-day technical support and runs EarthSky's fundraiser website. In his free time, he designs and manages websites for small businesses and freelancers.

Chelynne Campion

Production/ Sales Assistant
Chelynne Campion is a Production/ Sales Assistant for EarthSky. Her family just purchased a telescope, and she's now learning to be a stargazer!

Kelly Whitt

Editor and Author
Kelly Kizer Whitt has been a science writer specializing in astronomy for more than two decades. She began her career at Astronomy Magazine, and she has made regular contributions to AstronomyToday and the Sierra Club, among other outlets. Her children’s picture book, Solar System Forecast, was published in 2012. She has also written a young adult dystopian novel titled A Different Sky. When she is not reading or writing about astronomy and staring up at the stars, she enjoys traveling to the national parks, creating crossword puzzles, running, tennis, and paddleboarding. Kelly lives in Wisconsin.

Marcy Curran

Editor and Author
Marcy Curran has enjoyed star gazing since she was a young girl going on family camping trips under the dark skies of Wyoming. She bought her first telescope in time to see Halley’s Comet in 1985. Her passion for astronomy eventually led her to being a co-founder of a local astronomical society. Marcy remains active in her astronomy club, including serving as the editor of a monthly newsletter. She also contributes a monthly article to her local newspaper focusing on the stars, planets and objects currently visible in the night sky. Marcy taught astronomy at her local community college for over 20 years.

Cristina Ortiz

Assistant Editor and Author
Cristina Ortiz - based in Granada, Spain - has been an EarthSky editor since 2021. "Since I was a kid," she says, "I could feel that passion for science and communication." Cristina has a master’s degree in translation and interpreting, specializing in science and technology. She has served as a translator, interpreter and proofreader in both science and technology for various media organizations, including Netflix, and for museums and other companies.

Claudia Crowley

Editor
Claudia Crowley proofs and edits EarthSky website material. She says working for EarthSky is the most exciting job she's had except one other - which was editing space shuttle documentation at NASA JSC. After writing and editing manuals for Dell and other major companies, she moved to the technical support side during the wild early days of the Internet, and served as general manager at a small wireless ISP. Claudia is a space enthusiast and fan of science.

C. Alex Young

Sun Team
C. Alex Young is a solar astrophysicist studying the Sun and space weather. Alex is passionate about sharing science with diverse audiences. This led him to start The Sun Today with his designer wife, Linda. First through Facebook and Twitter then adding an extensive website thesuntoday.org, the two work together to engage the public about the Sun and its role in our solar system. Alex led national engagement efforts for the 2017 total solar eclipse. He is the Associate Director for Science in the Heliophysics Science Division at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.

Raúl Cortés

Sun Team
Raúl Cortés studied engineering at the Autonomous University of Nuevo León in Monterrey, Mexico, obtained a scholarship to continue his studies in Japan and after returning to Monterrey he got credits on MBA from the Graduate School of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering Faculty. He became a teacher at the University UANL teaching Math and Physics and dedicated the rest of his professional career to serve in engineering areas for USA, Japan and Germany based corporations. His passion for the skies go back to when he was a child, always intrigued about the stars and constellations and reading and researching about the matter. From 2010 on, he dedicated his attention to photographing the stars, constellations, the moon and the sun. Raúl's work on his photography has been published and posted on the ESC as well as in other platforms and has gained attention to be published by local Monterrey newspapers.

Paul Scott Anderson

Contributing Author
Paul Scott Anderson has had a passion for space exploration that began when he was a child when he watched Carl Sagan’s Cosmos. While in school he was known for his passion for space exploration and astronomy. He started his blog The Meridiani Journal in 2005, which was a chronicle of planetary exploration. In 2015, the blog was renamed as Planetaria. While interested in all aspects of space exploration, his primary passion is planetary science. In 2011, he started writing about space on a freelance basis, and now currently writes for AmericaSpace and Futurism (part of Vocal). He has also written for Universe Today and SpaceFlight Insider, and has also been published in The Mars Quarterly and has done supplementary writing for the well-known iOS app Exoplanet for iPhone and iPad.

John Jardine Goss

Night Sky Cartographer
“I can sometimes see the moon in the daytime” was a cosmic revelation that John Jardine Goss first discovered through personal observations at age 6. It shook his young concept of the universe and launched his interest in astronomy and stargazing, a fascination he still holds today. John is past president of the Astronomical League, the largest U.S. federation of astronomical societies, with over 20,000 members. He's earned the title of Master Observer and has authored the celestial observing guides Exploring the Starry Realm and Carpe Lunam. John also writes a monthly stargazing column, Roanoke Skies, for the Roanoke Times, and a bimonthly column, Skywatch, for Blue Ridge Country magazine. He has contributed to Sky and Telescope magazine, the IDA Nightscape, the Astronomical League’s Reflector magazine, and the RASC Observer’s Handbook.

Theresa Wiegert

Assistant Editor
Theresa Wiegert is a Swedish-Canadian astronomer with a Ph.D. in astrophysics and a master's in physics. She has loved the sky and everything in it and beyond ever since she was four years old and asked her father about the very bright star she saw one early Christmas morning. Learning it wasn’t a star but the planet Venus, she started reading anything astronomy-related she could find. Eventually she ended up as a radio astronomer, researching gas in spiral galaxies. She loves science outreach and teaching, especially showing the night sky to groups of kids (and adults!).

Armando Caussade

Assistant Editor
Armando is well known as an astronomy educator, after 30+ years leading extensive initiatives of public outreach and 10+ years teaching in colleges. As one of only a handful of Puerto Rican science communicators during Comet Halley's last visit, he assumed a pioneering role starting in 1985 when science was just beginning to enter the local mindset; over time his work brought meaningful change to the culture, inspiring people to pursue interests in science and technology. His affiliations include Ana G. Méndez University–Cupey, where in 2014 he spearheaded an 8-course extension program focusing on observational astronomy, the first ever in the island.

Michael Maimone

Michael Maimone is an assistant editor for EarthSky and has always had a strong passion for communicating scientific complexity in a way that could easily be understood by anyone. Michael graduated from Penn State University in 2019 with dual Bachelor of Science degrees in Planetary Science & Astronomy and Meteorology & Atmospheric Science. He has experience in radio astronomy research with the Green Bank Observatory and even as a mission operations specialist for NASA’s Curiosity and Perseverance Mars rovers. He is currently working towards a master’s degree in systems engineering at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.

Will Triggs

Will Triggs fell in love with stargazing after moving to Norfolk on England's east coast, where the dark skies allowed him to catch a glimpse of the Milky Way for the first time. Having joined EarthSky after completing degrees in English and Creative Writing, he is passionate about communicating the beauty of the world around us, and the importance of protecting it.

Shireen Gonzaga

Contributor
Shireen Gonzaga is a freelance writer who enjoys writing about natural history. She is also a technical editor at an astronomical observatory where she works on documentation for astronomers. Shireen has many interests and hobbies related to the natural world. She lives in Cockeysville, Maryland.

Dave Adalian

Contributing Author
Award-winning reporter and editor Dave Adalian's love affair with the cosmos began during a long-ago summer school trip to the storied and venerable Lick Observatory atop California's Mount Hamilton, east of San Jose in the foggy Diablos Mountain Range and far above Monterey Bay at the edge of the endless blue Pacific Ocean. That field trip goes on today, as Dave still pursues his nocturnal adventures, perched in the darkness at his telescope's eyepiece or chasing wandering stars through the fields of night with the unaided eye. A lifelong resident of California's Tulare County - an agricultural paradise where the Great San Joaquin Valley meets the Sierra Nevada in endless miles of grass-covered foothills - Dave grew up in a wilderness larger than Delaware and Rhode Island combined, one choked with the greatest diversity of flora and fauna in the US, one which passes its nights beneath pitch black skies rising over the some of highest mountain peaks and greatest roadless areas on the North American continent. Dave studied English, American literature and mass communications at the College of the Sequoias and the University of California, Santa Barbara. He has worked as a reporter and editor for a number of news publications on- and offline during a career spanning nearly 30 years so far. His fondest literary hope is to share his passion for astronomy and all things cosmic with anyone who wants to join in the adventure and explore the universe's past, present and future.

Lia De La Cruz

Editorial Assistant
Lia De La Cruz is a journalist based in Southern California. She joined EarthSky in September 2020, with previous writing published in outlets including SkyFeed, Smore Magazine, and Bang It Out on Science. In her free time, she enjoys reading and volunteering.

Deborah Byrd in 1978 at McDonald Observatory. Photo by Marsha Canright. EarthSky staff, circa 1992. Deborah Byrd, control panel, Palomar telescope. Deborah Byrd and Joel Block, circa 1985. EarthSky staff, circa 2010.

2024 EarthSky Fundraiser

Any amount will help us reach our goal.

Would you consider

donating?

If you've already donated, we apologize for the popup and greatly appreciate your support.