[AZ-Observing] GCSP_2013_South_Rim_Day_5
- From: Skylook123@xxxxxxx
- To: taaaforum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, az-observing@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 13 Jun 2013 14:56:42 -0400 (EDT)
Grand Canyon Star Party - DAY FIVE - Clouds Roll Out
Location: Grand Canyon Visitor Center, South Rim of Grand Canyon, AZ, about
340 miles north of home in Tucson, about 7000 ft elevation
Weather: Low 80s at Noon, Low 70s at sunset, 60s during our time there
tonight. Sky was mostly covered until about 10 PM, then exploded in glorious
starlight.
Seeing and Transparency: Sucker holes early, clearing quite a bit after 10
PM. Seeing, despite the upper layer winds, was almost as good as last
weekend. Moisture still interfered a bit, but better than the last few nights.
Equipment:
18â f/5 2286mm Teeter Telescope newtonian truss dob, Sky Commander DSCs
10" Meade SCT on Atlas EQ-G mount
Mallincam Junior video imaging system on 10", 13.3" LCD monitor.
Just as yesterday, the early total sky coverage should have kept visitors
away, but many turned out anyway.
Wayne Thomas rescued us during setup. He had a spare splitter, so I was
able to run the mount, monitor, and camera from the two deep cycle
batteries. Once again, we were ready for the sky to clear as predicted.
My counterpart for GCSP from the National Park Service, Interpretive Ranger
Marker Marshall, did her perfect presentation: Starry, Starry Nights, the
universe as seen from Grand Canyon National Park. It is sort of a basic
introduction to the structure of the solar system and Milky Way, factually
rich yet expressed in a way to give a feeling of distance and comparative
size of common visible artificats of the Grand Canyon night sky. I always
learn a lot from her style and construction of presentation; great skills to
learn from a professional.
Back at the scopes, the sky was still mostly obscurred by cloud but my wife
Susan had the scope on Saturn, and it was a beautiful view. With the
blockage of the sky so extreme, I decided not to interrupt and start the video
since the 9PM sky tour was about to start. I went over to help Alan Delman
with the tour; he was baking the cake, my job was to put the cultural
frosting on the physical sky descriptions. We had various sky elements
popping
in and out, so we were able to do a good job at the physical nature of the
sky, and wrap it in a bit of how other cultures would look at what we were
now seeing.
I stuck around and did the 9:30 and 10 tours, and the sky was rapidly
opening up. The Milky Way, rising above the trees, was starting to scream at
us to look in wonder. The southern end, in Sagittarius, surprised one
visitor because it cast a small shadow. Those to groups got the "gift" of
being
able to brag about looking at a black hole, the core of our galaxy. The
understood that they couldn't really "see" the black hole, but now they
could brag that they looked toward one. We were able to touch on the nature
of
looking to the sky to bring a real or imagined structure to life, as
cultures have always been called to do. The Seminole concept of the Great
Rift
in the Milky Way looking like arms, and the comfort it brings in this
season to see it rise and imagine that the Great Spirit has his people
protected
in his arms, gets a great reaction. With the opening and closing of the
sky at various times, ending with a mostly wike open view, allowed all three
groups to get both the physical structure of the ecliptic, Polaris,
precession of the poles, core of the galaxy, and the last two groups got the
extra
benefit of the North Galactic Pole being quite visible next to Mel-111,
the Coma Berenices Open Cluster (plus the legend of it's origin). VERY
enthusiastic groups who joined us despite the early skies being obscured.
I got back to the scope, and because the wind had died down grandson
Stephen had started up the big dob. He had wanted to know which eyepiece to
use, so at the start of the 9:30 tour I told him to take and eyepiece I knew
was a 26mm wide angle. He took the wrong one, a 9mm Nagler, and was showing
a humongous Saturn but having to ladder climb every three visitors to
recenter. He had been hiking most of the day, his legs were giving out, so he
went over to Polaris and did his multiple star show.
Meanwhile, with Susan and granddaughter Karina having left, I said what the
heck, and fired up the video. This is always a bit of a thrash since the
focus has to be so extremely adjusted but I got it in and it was a
screamer. So, for the first time with this object, I switched on the internal
zoom and the doggone thing filled about 20% of the 13.3" monitor. Visitors
marvelled at the huge view, lucky shot on the focus, Cassini division in
plain sight, great shadow band on the planet, and a nice V shadow against the
rear ring plane. Oh WOW.
Then the usual equipment gremlin. Karina and used a velcro tie to take up
some of the slack in the dual power/data line from the camera, and I went
to try the Hercules Cluster. In the dark I hadn't noticed the cord path,
and the cluster was in the same meridian as Saturn so the mount did not
follow the cord unwrap algorithm. Luckily, I noticed what was happening just
in time and was able to catch the camera in mid flight as the cord pulled it
out of the visual back. Good thing I hadn't tightened it too snugly. But
the adventure killed the 12V power cord. Had a spare, swapped it out,
gave up on M13 since I had to be on the ground to center it overhead, and
Stephen helped pack up. It was 1 AM! Totally lost track of time, but Saturn
was SO gorgeous in the monitor it was worth it.
Getting ready for a public service outreach we do every year over at the
Kaibab Learning Center, where I'll set up on the Moon with the SCT, and Sun
in the Lunt, (Video on this one), and do some teaching before tonight's
show, me presenting how telescopes really work.
Can't wait to get back to other video treats tonight!!
Jim O'Connor
South Rim Coordinator
Grand Canyon Star Party
_gcsp@tucsonastronomy.org_ (mailto:gcsp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx)
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