Sean Barraclough

I'm a web developer based in the UK with a strong interest in science data and how it can be presented clearly for people who aren't specialists. Planetary science sits at an odd intersection: the numbers are genuinely fascinating, the public data is excellent, but most of the tools built around it are either too technical or too sensationalised.

closeapproach.space started because I wanted a single place to check upcoming asteroid close approaches without wading through press releases or NASA data tables that weren't built for casual reading. The NeoWs API makes that data freely accessible. I built the interface around it.

I also run auroratonight.space , a live aurora forecast and Kp index tracker for people in the UK and northern Europe who want to know whether the northern lights are worth stepping outside for. Same philosophy: public data, clean display, no fuss.