Observers: Paul Martini, Scott Adams, Roberta Humphreys
Telescope Operator: Geno Bechetti
Support Astronomer: Michelle Edwards
Instrument: MODS1

Observing Log for 2013 May 1/2

Summary:
Observed a spectrophotometric standard during evening twilight.  Clear skies
with seeing ~1" early on.  Started UVa_n2460, but encountered telescope
problems halfway through it that caused us to lose 2 hours.  The rest of 
this program will need to be executed on a future night.  Observed
NGC5055_f1.  Very poor seeing the second half of the night.  Took some
observations for SN2012ei.  This program will also need to be completed 
on a future night.  Observed a 2nd spectrophotometric standard during
the morning twilight.

Details:

Starting calibrations - UT 11:00
execMODS NGC5055_f1.cal	(run-time ~16 min)
execMODS NGC5055_f2.cal
	(twice in the execution of these 2 scripts time-out errors were
reported)
execMODS NGC5055_f3.cal
NOTE: due to the TCS link being down header information from the telescope is
missing for these calibration scripts (NGC5055_f[1-3].cal)

UT 11:50
venting the dome

UT 12:30
Skies are clear and calm at twilight.  Photometric.

UT 12:40
0.9" seeing
starting acquisition of spectrophotometric standard Feige 34
communication issue with TCS... lost 15 min

UT 1:03
execMODS feige34_dualgrat.obs

UT 1:20
acqMODS n2460.acq

UT 1:30
execMODS n2460.obs 

seeing 1.1"

UT 1:50
acqMODS n2460_sf.acq 

seeing degraded to 1.6"

execMODS n2460_sf.obs 
UT 2:25
lost guiding & tracking 1/2 through the 2nd exposure - stopping exposure early
(but some of the exposure still wasn't taken with the benefit of tracking)
Major issues with the telescope -- everything is frozen
Lost UT 2:25-4:25 (2 hrs) due to these problems
Still need to complete 2x900s exposures for n2460_sf and all of ic2209.

UT 4:25
acqMODS NGC5055_f1.acq
1.2" seeing

UT 4:45
execMODS NGC5055_f1.obs 
UT 5:30 - seeing degraded to 1.7"
UT 5:45 - seeing degraded to 2.1"

UT 7:00
acqMODS SN2012ei.acq

UT 7:30
seeing 1.5"
execMODS SN2012ei.obs 
	due to time constraints we only took 3 of the 8 images tonight (the
other 5 will be taken another night)
seeing degraded to 3"

UT 8:40
guide star lost during the readout of the 3rd image
started a new image without tracking... aborted
restarting a new 4th image now that tracking is back
seeing 2.6"
aborting again... poor seeing and not enough time left
Still need to complete 5x1200s to complete this script.  

UT 8:45
acqMODS bd332642.acq 
UT 8:55
execMODS bd332642_dualgrat.obs 

UT 9:45
Starting morning calibrations:
execMODS bias8K.cal
execMODS bias3K.cal
execMODS M101F1.cal
execMODS M101F3.cal
execMODS EAGES_J1425.cal
execMODS EAGES_365043.cal