The careers guidance office was absolutely fantastic and extremely helpful. They interviewed me (more of a chat really) and we discussed what it was that I wanted to do – it wasn’t really a discussion about jobs, just what I liked to do and what things interested me and science came top of the list. They quickly identified a third-level qualification I could try for and they even arranged an interview with the polytechnic. It was all plain sailing after that.

As regards astronomy, even though it’s not a “job”, the prime motivator for me was a colleague, Eamonn Ansbro, who was doing some scientific work for a PhD. After chatting with him extensively, I decided that I was going to follow that path as best I could. And sure enough, a few years later I’m providing quality data to the Minor Planet Centre and sending in data to the Jet Propulsion Lab in support of the Dawn Mission.

There really isn’t a typical day in health and safety. There are common themes though – lots of questions from clients, deadlines to meet, novel or complex problems that take time to work through and a need to communicate all this in plain understandable language.

For the astronomy side of things, a typical day would involve checking the weather. If we’re all go for a clear night, it’s a case of planning targets, writing scripts for the automation software and then getting the equipment ready for a night’s run of taking images. The images are then analysed and data generated. Thus is then formatted before being sent to the Jet Propulsion Lab or the Minor Planet Centre.

I am required to carry out consultancy work and training. Consultancy involves carrying out noise assessments, chemical/biological exposure assessments, thermal comfort surveys and working with people using display screen equipment (VDUs) to make sure they are safe and healthy.

I carry out training in a wide variety of health and safety subjects and train all kinds of people from operators through to directors. Along with all of this, I have to keep up to date with all the latest legislation and guidance coming out of the EU and the Health and Safety Authority.

With the astronomy, the main tasks are reporting positional data on asteroids. Some are far away, some are close by and warrant us keeping a close eye on them to see if they might come a little too close for comfort.

I don’t know about cool, but there is a buzz – even after 25 plus years in the profession – when you do something that changes someone’s viewpoint on health and safety and they start to do things the right way in order to protect themselves.

There’s loads of cool stuff with astronomy. I’ve been fortunate enough to do some work with RTÉ – both live and recorded. I even got to do a film review on the Moon landings. As well as meeting the RTÉ folks like Dave Fanning and Derek Mooney, it’s great to communicate the message that astronomy is interesting, fun and very accessible to everyone.

The coolest astronomy thing, though, has to be having an asteroid bearing my name. With all my achievements, one very kind colleague put my name forward to the International Astronomical Union and they named asteroid number 21782 after me. So asteroid Davemcdonald will be whizzing around the solar system for a few billion years after I’m well gone. Now that’s cool!

I think the most important quality is communication. You really need to get your message across quickly, simply and accurately, especially when you’re talking science. It really doesn’t help if you come across as an egghead!

The basic school subjects of maths, chemistry, biology and physics were crucial. Unfortunately, I was rubbish at higher level physics but it didn’t have a detrimental effect. I’ve managed to learn enough physics to keep me going.

I have to say that English was also very important. I usually communicate in writing reports – they need to be clear, concise and grammatically correct. English was a big help and I did much better at that than physics. The IT diploma was a real boon to me. Doing formal study in that area has been a fantastic help.

For work, I would like to think that I’ve made a positive difference to my clients’ employees. If I have prevented an accident or someone getting sick or going deaf, that to me is invaluable. And I think I’ve done that on many occasions.

In astronomy, I would hope that my small contributions will encourage others to strive for more, and perhaps one day Ireland will be able to match its past achievements in this area.

A caring attitude is essential for Health and Safety – you need to be passionate about getting the message across to people and telling them why it is so important. After all, no-one wants to see anyone suffer harm or be in pain.

For astronomy, a yearning for answering the unanswered questions is a must. You also need to be dedicated and focused and not put off by the weather