Date: Thu, 8 Apr 2004 04:48:59 -0600 (MDT)
From: Jack Dembicky
Subject: 3.5m Night Log 20040407
                          Apache Point Observatory
                          3.5m Telescope Night Log
                          Wednesday, April 7, 2004
                                                           ACTUAL
 ASTRONOMER      OBSERVER(S)            INSTRUMENT     START FINISH
 --------------------------------------------------------------------
 G.Stringfellow  G.Stringfellow         DIS            19:15  21:30
 M.Drosback      M.Drosback             Echelle        21:30  00:10
 M.Strauss       J.Hennawi              SPIcam         03:00  04:00
  INST        SCHEDULED      WEATH     EQUIP     OBS     DAY  NOT USED
 I/RO/DN     START FINISH   D    B    D    B    D    B   USE   D    B
 ---------------------------------------------------------------------
 CU03/R      20:23  21:23   0    0    0    0   1.0   0    0    0    0
 CU04/R      21:23  01:00   0   0.8   0    0   1.0  1.8   0    0    0
 PU04/R      01:00  05:47   0   3.8   0    0    0   1.0   0    0    0
  note: scheduled times listed include instrument change time
                 ------------- ACTIVITY LOG --------------
  Observing Specialist: J.Dembicky, J. Barentine (setup)
 John did the instrument setup for me tonight.  I came in just around
 sunset and took over from there.  Skies were clear with excellent seeing.
 The first program for the night (we had 3 scheduled) finished around
 21:30.  I switched over to the Echelle and proceeded to focus. I managed
 to kill the guider somehow and needed to soft reboot the guider
 controller computer. The guider crashed again about 10 mins later when
 Meredith tried starting an autoguide sequence.  I just quit and restarted
 the guider software this time, which seemed to fix the problem.  We can't
 manage to kill this guider during an engineering run (running exposures
 all night) but the first night back on the sky we get two crashes!!!  Go
 figure.
 At 00:10, with no warning, the rain sensor suddenly went off.  A single
 passing cloud (I was watching it on the cloudcam) decided to sprinkle a
 few drops.  The cloud had completely dissapated about 2 mins later and
 we were again under almost entirely clear skies, but with more clouds
 approaching from the S/W (not visible on radar at all). We decided to
 stay close for a while.
 After much frustration of puffy clouds forming and dissapating overhead,
 and a nice low pressure system winding up and staying just out of reach
 for over 2 hrs.  I decided to go ahead and open at 02:50 (and turn the
 APO cloud magnets on, that's a joke!).  Without fail, in less than 30
 minutes here come the clouds.  This time thin, but clouds none the less.
 The clouds became too thick for getting anything useful after around
 04:00.  Gave up at 04:30.
 A very frustrating night, weatherwise.
 At the end of the night I left the Echelle guider taking 3 sec exposures
 to see if I could get it to crash during the day.
                          ------- FAILURE LOG -------
  PROG   INST   FAILURE MODE     TIME
       (SEGDFVO)    TI/SHU   START  FINISH  DESCRIPTION
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
                 ---------------- FOCUS LOG ---------------
                                        Air/Truss   Wind
 Time   Instrument   Focus     Az  El    Temp-C    Dir MPH  filt  FWHM
 ---------------------------------------------------------------------
 20:17  SPIcam     60(1393)   236  41   5.6/7.3    261   6   Ha   0.81
 20:30  NA2gdr    41(49041)   239  39   5.6/6.9    237   8  clear 0.77
 21:43  Echelle     29(253)   245  74   5.4/6.0      -   -  none  0.75
 03:02  SPIcam     30(1120)   123  69   3.7/3.8    199   7    z'  0.7
 03:07  NA2gdr   -353(48646)  126  70   4.0/3.8    222   6    R   1.26
                 ------------- WEATHER LOG ----------------
                                  Wind                       Precip.or
      Time   Temp F Dewp F  MPH  Direction    Dust    Sky    Conditions
      ------------------------------------------------------------------
     17:01    48    31     13   296  (WNW)    221  Pt. Cldy     none
     18:01    50    33      6   286  (WNW)    215  Mst. Clr     none
     19:01    45    29      1   274  (W)      253    Clear      none
     20:01    41    30      6   265  (W)      277    Clear      none
     21:01    41    29      2   205  (SSW)    308   Pt. Cldy    none
     22:01    42    30     11   216  (SW)     390   Pt. Cldy    none
     23:01    41    29      9   196  (SSW)    447   Pt. Cldy    none
     00:01    41    29      9   188  (S)      458   Pt. Cldy    none
     01:01    40    30      6   195  (SSW)    531   Pt. Cldy    none
     02:01    41    28      9   210  (SSW)    551   Pt. Cldy    none
     03:01    39    29      6   213  (SSW)    552   Mst. Cldy   none
     04:01    40    30      8   223  (SW)     53M     Cloudy    none
     Note: the wind was coming from the azimuth listed.  The convention
     used is north=0 degrees, east=90 degrees.  The dust count is
     particles > 1u per 0.1 cubic feet.
                                 TELESCOPE STATUS
     Telescope drives operational. Current Remark version: 2.85b
     Current guide software version: guider v4.1b4
     Current TCC version: 2.7.2  Current TUI version: TUI-0.842