[AZ-Observing] Blue Hills and Cherry Rd.
- From: "Stanley A. Gorodenski" <stan_gorodenski@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: az-observing@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 29 Jun 2003 10:04:43 -0800
What a nice night it was last night at Blue Hills. It was warmer than
last weekend, but still comfortable. As the night progressed the breeze
died and it became completely still. Last Saturday AJ rated the seeing
as 7. I am not into ratings, but based on last weekend's viewing
compared to last night, I would guess it was at least 8. The double
double in Lyra were split very nice at 300x, the best I've seen for some
time, although at a separation of about 2.1 arc seconds or so it is not
such a good test. Even if not an 8, it was better than last weekend for
sure though. Mars was a disappointment. At 1:30 it looked like it was
being viewed through rippling running water. The large size of the
turbulence cells and the direction from the horizon to the zenith (or
thereabouts) makes me think it might have been caused by observatory
cooling. Normally, there is always a slight breeze. Last night it was
dead calm for awhile. I was observing Mars over the landing, which is
not that massive (made of steel with wood planks), and a very-very small
section of the roof. Could it be the stillness of the night made the
thermals from cooling more obvious than normal? I would have thought by
1:30 am this would not have been a problem, at least not such as large a
problem as it was. Maybe those at the Cherry Road Site can shed some
light on this (I should point out, though, that I was observing this hot
air caused turbulence in the direction of the site <g>). I would guess
the seeing was also good there.
Stan
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