Volodymyr Maňko

Born in 1972 in Kyiv, where I graduated from school and the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute with a degree in chemical engineering-technology. I tried to publish my first article on astronomical topics in 1990, not very successfully. In the summer of the same year, I took part in an expedition to the band of a total solar eclipse in Chukotka under the leadership of Klym Ivanovych Churiumov, with whom I maintained friendly relations until his death (the eclipse could not be seen due to bad weather). In 1991-1992, I wrote several articles on astronomy for the newspaper “Vechirniy Kyiv”, already under the pseudonym Volodymyr Ostriv.

I started writing materials for The Universe Space Tech magazine in 2004, and joined the editing staff in August 2005. Published on its pages more than one and a half hundred articles and one science fiction story “The Principle of non-interference”. Participated in the media support of the XXIX and XXX General Assemblies of the International Astronomical Union, two STARMUS festivals (2016, 2019). I have observed three total (1999, 2006, 2017) and one annular (2012) solar eclipse, two transits of Venus, three transits of Mercury (2003, 2016, 2019), and almost a hundred comets. The southernmost point that could be reached is the city of Salinas (Puerto Rico), the northernmost is the village of Chokurdakh (Yakutia—Sakha), the easternmost is the city of Pevek (Chukotsky District), the western is the town of Waialua (Oahu Island).