LBT OSU/RC Partner Observing Notes Date: 2014 November 21 UTC (Night 2 of 8) Observers: Ben Shappee, Rick Pogge (OSU) Support Astronomer: Olga Kuhn Telescope Operator: Steve Allenson SUMMARY: MODS1 night. High clouds coming in ahead of heavier stuff that should arrive later Friday and (maybe) bring a dusting of snow (so says the NWS). Cirrus and episodes of atrocious seeing were our biggest issues, in between we had few-hour-wide clear patches and seeing as good as 0.7-arcsec, so a mixed bag. Programs Observed: OSU_Z6: DES2154+0126, but problem with cirrus - check: probably compromised OSU_ASASSN: ASASSN14az and ASASSSN14dc during cirrus, usable spectra OSU_AGN: Mrk590 during poor seeing episode & cirrus, usable spectra UVa_MGiant: mgiant4 started but compromised by cloud band, mgiant10 much better, good data UM_RMHStars: M33C-7292 in good (0.8") seeing and in wide cloud gap - got good data OSU_MClusters: NGC2112 Field C (N2C) mask, seeing variable but good transparency OSU_SN2014J: a few compromised by cirrus and bad seeing episodes, but got enough. We did not mark UVa_MGiant/mgiant4 as done. Check OSU_Z6/DES2154 and perhaps unmark. Observing Notes: All times are UTC unless otherwise noted 00:00 - Startup, no problems. High clouds in bands, wind<10m/s so vent doors 01:22 - Feige 110, seeing about 1.2 or so and variable. Cirrus around but relatively thin 01:26 - Executing, slight delay (forgot to edit obs script to eliminate unneeded modes, oops). Doing Dual Grating and Dual Prism modes for the P1 programs on the list. Seeing improving through the sequence 01:43 - OSU_Z6 DES2154+0126. Dual prism, 2x1200s with 10" dither and z-band filter acquisition. Seeing 1.0" or less. Slight problem seeing it as it is faint at z, took a 120s confirmatory image to acquire. Problem is background at z is higher than usual, Had to bump up the thru-slit image to 120sec to see the target in the slit. 02:00 - Started science script, seeing about 0.9" at start, down to 0.7 during first integration. Briefly puffed up to 1"+ middle of the second integration. At readout of 2nd integration had >1mag of cirrus, so we'll move to something brighter, in band 2 since all band 1 programs want less cirrus until this passes. 02:44 - OSU_ASASSN, ASASSN14az. HA=-1, Cirrus about 1.5 mag, this can take it. Overluminous SNeII, dual grating mode. Guide star too far at edge of patrol field, zernikes running away. Selected a new guide star (NOMAD1 0878-0926566) less far off axis. Re-acquiring. Seeing ~1", definitely cirrus on the all-sky cam. 03:00 - started science script after adding -0.12" x offset. Seeing ~1.1 arcsec, sometimes lower. Definitely cirrus (gstar counts fluctuating), went up nearly 2mag during exposure sequence 03:39 - OSU_ASASSN, ASASSN14dc, Cirrus ~1mag & variable, seeing ~0.9" Overluminous SNeIa, dual grating mode. 0.9-1.0" seeing 03:50 - started science script, SN dead center of slit. 3x900s. Seeing blew up to 1.2" during instrument configuration into dual grating mode. Variable through integrations. Up to 1.3+, later back towards 1.1, then last image was 0.8-0.9. Guide star varied through 1.5mag peak-to-peak during sequence. Going to be one of those nights... 04:42 - UVa_Mgiants, mgiant4_medium.acq (seeing around 0.9"). Centering is good, target is faint. Still got cirrus around. 04:52 - executing science script - 2x600s, dual grating, 0.8" slit. Seeing about 0.9". During first exposure the seeing puffed up to 1.3, then back down to 1" shortly after the start of exposure 2. Took a third 600s image because the first got clobbered. Exposure #3 started at 05:18. Still about 1 mag of cirrus. Target is faint in the spectrum. We started out OK, but got progressivly worse conditions during exposures. 2nd and 3rd are better, 1 was compromised by a puff of unstable air. Will dispense with the post image, as this observation is a loss due to sudden thickening cirrus and unstable seeing. 05:30 - Executing poor condition target, OSU_AGN, Mrk590. Bide time until a gap in the clouds gets to us in about an hour(?). Cirrus and seeing about 1.1 arcsec, puffing up to 1.2. 05:39 - executing science script, 4x300s dual grating mode 5" slit Seeing 1.1 arcsec, around 1" for first two, then puffed to 1.2 during start of 3. Cirrus starting to thin out, seeing now 0.9" during last of sequence. 06:08 - UVa_Mgiants, mgiant10. Cirrus passed and we are in a fat gap until the next wave. Maybe 1-2h? Seeing 0.9", so running the median script and hopeing seeing and transparency hold. mgiant10's observing window just opened, biasing towards brighter targets just in case. Much better conditions than during mgiant4 06:16 - executing science script - dual grating 2x600s. Seeing 0.8 and guide star photometry is steady - definitely in a better place. Much better spectrum than the comparably bright mgiant4. 06:41 - executing post-spectrum thru-slit image script 30s i image 06:44 - UM_RMHstars - M33C-7292 acquisition. Seeing 0.8-arcsec, still in the gap between clouds. Needed to use -B flag in modsAlign to see both stars. Spot on. 06:56 - executing science script. Seeing 0.7-0.8 arcsec, guide star counts steady. 3x600s dual grating mode. At last 40sec of spectrum 3 (of 3), seeing puffed to 1-arcsec. Even so, clean separation of the two stars in both channels. 07:34 - OSU_MClusters, NGC2112 Field C (N2C) acquisition Guide star too far off axis, using NOMAD1 0902-0070694, shadow does not occult mask slits even though the star is on the science field boundary. Seeing is 1.2 arcsec Problem with previous abort. doing thru-slit acq by hand... Field image 0055, Mask image 0056 (swapped order) Confirmatory image 0057 Mask is slightly off vertically 07:50 - Acquiring data, red only grating, 4x840sec. Seeing 1.2 to 1.4 arcsec (program can tolerate 1.5 max). Guide star counts are constant, but seeing is jumping all over. 08:48 - On another window, woke up LUCI for training, and decided to start the dark calibrations for the LUCI programs.... 08:54 - OSU_SN2014J - acquisition. Seeing is 1.3-1.5 arcsec. SN is bright so we can tolerate poor seeing. 09:10 - Executing science script. 6x1800s. Seeing has blown up during first exposure, staying around 2-3" during the first hour of the observation, clouds coming over towards end of exposure 2 of 6. 11:17 - Still lots of clouds (~2 mags), seeing crummy but a bit better 1.5-2" 11:27 - ~(2-3) mags of clouds (ack, ththththtp!) 12:24 - starting another exposure on 2014J going into twilight to collect as many photons as be can to make up for the crappy clouds and seeing, especially at the start of the sequence. Seeing was best of this sequence, ending at 0.8". 12:54 - Feige 34 Standard Star acquisition. 13:01 - executing calibration script - dual grating and red grating (for OSU_MCluster) 13:20 - All Done for the night