Date: Sat, 5 Mar 2005 06:22:42 -0700 (MST) From: Jack Dembicky Subject: 3.5m Night Log 20050304 Apache Point Observatory 3.5m Telescope Night Log Friday, March 4, 2005 ACTUAL ASTRONOMER OBSERVER(S) INSTRUMENT START FINISH -------------------------------------------------------------------- D.York M.Hammergren DIS --:-- --:-- G.Richards G.Richards,M.Oguri DIS 19:26 21:45 D.York D.York DIS --:-- --:-- INST SCHED(TWILIGHT) WEATH EQUIP OBS DAY NOT USED I/RO/DN START FINISH D B D B D B USE D B ---------------------------------------------------------------------- UC08/R 18:57 19:26 0.5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 PU02/R 19:26 00:10 2.4 0 0 0 2.3 0 0 0 0 UC04/R 00:10 05:32 2.9 2.5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 note: scheduled times listed include instrument change time ------------- ACTIVITY LOG -------------- Observing Specialist: J.Dembicky Thick cirrus to start the night for the UC08 program, we didn't open. A hole started to open around 19:05 and after waiting a few minutes to make sure it looked real I decided it safe to open around 19:26 to start the PU02 program. We closed briefly around 21:45 due to clouds, but when I got up to look thing over from the telescope catwalk things looked to have improved over the previous 15 mins (Gordon was doing a long exposure that I let him finish), so maybe 12 mins was lost due to weather while I changed my mind to stay open. Within a half of an hour the sky completely clouded over (long before Gordon could get another image) so I chalked this time up as lost due to weather, it started clouding up again just shortly after I decided to stay open. I finally closed the enclosure around 22:25 just to be safe. I opened around 03:40 after the clouds moved out for about the past 20 mins or so and it looked like there was a clearing. It didn't last long. We just finished focusing and Don just got on his first target when the first clouds started moving in from the South. Mike and I watched it outside as it passed overhead and another clearing seemed to be behind it, although it looked like we were going to have waves of clouds for the rest of the night. At 04:25 the rain sensor tripped, while Don was collecting photons, and I immedietly closed the mirror covers on his exposure and flew up the stairs. Covers were close by the time I got up there and light snow was falling in the dome, unfortunately the mirror was just above freezing (0.4C) a little snow (Grapple) that landed on it before the covers closed had melted. The snow was not prominent on the IR satellite (the worst of the weather was already over us with not a hint of precipitation in that, and what appeared to be a clearing approaching from the SW. Guess not. That pretty much closed us for the rest of the night, with only a little over an hour left and no useful data for 2nd half at all. I left the mirror covers open for the next hour or so and I could see no signs of any water on the mirror when I closed up in the morning. Since the temps were just below freezing and a lt. snow was falling when I was leaving this morning, I decided to turn the roof heaters on. ------- FAILURE LOG ------- PROG INST FAILURE MODE TIME (SEGDFNVO) TI/SHU START FINISH DESCRIPTION ----------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------- FOCUS LOG --------------- Air/Truss Wind Time Instrument Focus Az El Temp-C Dir MPH filt FWHM --------------------------------------------------------------------- 19:36 DISslit -100(834) 71 61 1.6/3.3 173 13 none 0.92 19:42 NA2gdr -3963(27036) 69 63 1.6/3.0 156 15 R 0.75 03:49 DISslit -25(815) 69 62 0.2/1.0 139 12 none 1.45 03:50 NA2gdr -4379(26620) 69 63 0.3/1.0 146 12 R 1.14 ------------- WEATHER LOG ---------------- Wind Precip.or Time Temp F Dewp F MPH Direction Dust Sky Conditions ------------------------------------------------------------------ 16:01 41 21 10 216 (SW) 272 Cloudy none 17:01 37 19 2 187 (S) 261 Cloudy none 18:01 35 18 12 132 (SE) 263 Cloudy none 19:01 35 12 15 141 (SE) 276 Pt. Cldy none 20:01 35 12 16 136 (SE) 271 Pt. Cldy none 21:01 34 16 20 126 (SE) 269 Pt. Cldy none 22:01 34 18 14 115 (ESE) 287 Pt. Cldy none 23:01 35 15 21 128 (SE) 271 Cloudy none 00:01 36 16 20 148 (SSE) 385 Cloudy none 01:01 36 19 15 160 (SSE) 402 Cloudy none 02:01 37 20 11 172 (S) 530 Cloudy none 03:01 35 20 12 146 (SE) 452 Cloudy none 04:01 34 21 13 146 (SE) 495 Cloudy Grapple 05:01 35 23 9 171 (S) 543 Cloudy none 06:01 32 28 6 128 (SE) 543 Cloudy Lt. Snow 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. Note: The Tower Dust counter appears to be down at this time TELESCOPE STATUS Telescope drives operational. Current Remark version: 2.85b Current TCC version: 2.7.2 Current TUI version: TUI 0.94b2