[AZ-Observing] Observing Report - GCSP South Rim - Day 8 - The Weather Hammer Falls
- From: skylook123@xxxxxxx
- To: az-observing@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 13 Jun 2010 21:12:32 -0400
Grand Canyon Star Party South Rim - DAY EIGHT - The Weather Hammer Falls
Location: Yavapai Point Observing Station, South Rim of Grand Canyon, AZ, about
340 miles north of home in Tucson, about 7000 ft elevation
Weather: 40s at sunset, falling into 30s by 9 PM. Some early sucker holes in
the west at sundown slammed shut by 8:15 PM. Then some intermittent rain
sprinkles. Pretty much a lost evening.
Seeing and Transparency: None. Overcast with heavy rain clouds
Equipment:
Golf umbrella
The bad upper respiratory bug set in with a vengeance. Even if the sky was
clear, no setup for me tonight.
We had a nice pot luck lunch at Chuck Wahler's home. After retiring as a
Ranger, he is back at the Grand Canyon as a contractor working on education
programs (I think!) and still lives at the park, in a different house. It is
always a pleasure to meet with the volunteers away from the battleground.
Highlight for me was drafting Robert Lofquist, Bill and Mary's grandson
visiting for the week, to draw two names for door prizes offered by the Royal
Astronomical Society of Canada. Robert has been helping us by handing out star
maps at the evening talks, along with Audra Anderson the first three nights.
Erich Karkoshka won the 2011 Observer's Handbook, and Jerry Fennema won the
2011 Observer's Calendar. I donated the 2010 sample versions of the two to
Marker Marshall for use in her Starry Starry Nights Ranger talks.
A few hearty folk were hoping for the best as the swirling sky seemed to open a
bit to the west near sundown. I was hoping the coroner could start on his
autopsy and rid me of the bad cold. I think I've already lost both lungs, what
else could there be?
Our night talk crowd was sparse, maybe 50 or 60, and Sara Meschberger valiantly
performed her Preserving The Night Sky presentation. As is usual on these
adventures in the cold and wind, the pointing devices refused to cooperate so I
sat UNDER the table and flipped the slides through for her. Her talk was a
concise motivation to not lose the night sky for future generations. At the
end, I tried to fill some time with an overview of what could be seen in the
night sky, but around slide five the sprinkles started so we abandoned ship. We
were back in the room by 9PM so I could look for the missing lung.
So, now we're home. All in all, a remarkable week of great conversations,
education opportunities, and expanding horizons for several thousand visitors
over the week. Through the week we had 75 volunteers turn in service sheets,
and they did yeoman duty with making each contact with a visitor a special
moment. Today, as we dropped off some of the visitor log sheets from other
observers at Ranger Headquarters, we were told that visitors had been coming in
all week to thank the Park for the event. And we got stopped on the way back to
our truck by four individuals who told us that they came up to both final
nights of bad weather just because the volunteer astronomers were so
informative and helpful even without a sky to work with. WAY TO GO!!!
Jim O'Connor
South Rim Coordinator
Grand Canyon Star Party
gcsp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
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