MDM Observatory 2.4m Telescope Observer's Report for 2007 Apr 22

Observer(s): Mangala Sharma & Tom Statler
Institution(s): Ohio Univ

Instrument: 8k CCD Camera

Worked for 8 hours (all night)
Conditions were Non-Photometric most of the night.
Problems were encountered, see the separate trouble report for details.

Seeing and Weather:
   Clouds all night.
   Beg: Seeing 1.0 arcsec, Patchy Clouds, Winds Light & Variable
   Mid: Seeing 1.3 arcsec, Patchy Clouds, Winds Moderate, Variable seeing
   End: Seeing 1.6 arcsec, Patchy Clouds, Winds Light & Variable, Poor transparency

Observing Summary:

Weather was mediocre, with varying transparency and seeing all night long.
Waxing crescent Moon within 2 hours of a couple of our target galaxy groups
put paid to any hopes of doing deep imaging for the first couple of
hours in the early evening. The Moon's going to be even more of a challenge
the next 3 nights.

We encountered trouble with the Dewar warming up in the afternoon. We
refilled it with LN2 three times during the evening, each time ensuring
that the signs of fullness were seen - i.e. - drops/streams of liquified
gas venting. 
After midnight, we had trouble with the camera controller 
electronics. The latter caused us to lose about an hour of observing. 
Both the above are reported in detail in the trouble report.

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Submitted on 2007 Apr 23 [6:04:10]