MDM Observatory 1.3m Telescope Observing Report for 2010 Feb 19

Observer(s): Schroeder
Institution(s): Columbia

Instrument: Echelle

Worked for 10 hours (most of the night)
Conditions were Mixed most of the night.
Problems were encountered, see the separate trouble report for details.

Seeing and Weather:
   High Humidity from 12a until 4:30a.
   Beg: Seeing 1.5 arcsec, Cirrus, Winds High
   Mid: Seeing 1.5 arcsec, Cirrus, Winds Moderate
   End: Seeing 1.5 arcsec, Cirrus, Winds High

Observing Summary:

Moderate winds rocked the telescope making imaging difficult.
Fortunately, all the winds were coming from the south so as long as I kept observing north of zenith the dome sheltered the scope.
Humidity climbed throughout the night as the low pressure system came in.
We closed at 4:30 pm due to high humidity.
I noticed that the dewar lost a lot of liquid nitrogen on first slew. Is this normal?
The guider monitor is still jumping around, though I did not notice it affecting the guiding. Could the cables on the guider camera itself be the problem?

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Submitted on 2010 Feb 20 [4:42:29]