LBT OSU/RC Partner Observing Notes
Date: 2014 November 24 UTC (Night 5 of 8)
Observers: Ben Shappee, Rick Pogge (OSU)
Support Astronomer: D. Thompson (remote)
Telescope Operator: Steve Allenson

SUMMARY:

LUCI1 night.  High winds until about 0600, seeing was poor most of the
night, making target acquisition difficult.  Multiple shell RIPs
during the night with relatively quick recovery, and problem with
grating stability early.  Only got data for 2 programs due to the late
start and poor conditions.

Programs Observed:

  UVa_BCD_LUCI: J0133, difficult acquisition, but got target in the slit
  OSU_sn14j_ir: Late-type SNIa spectrum.  Had the wrong target at first but
                recovered.  Seeing was variable, on the poor side.


Observing Notes:

All times are UTC unless otherwise noted

00:00 - Winds gusty all afternoon, some 25-30m/s.  Clouds coming over
        in medium-thick bands from the west.  Temps falling steadily,
        -6C, was around 0C at sunrise.  Humidity was high all afternoon
        but falling rapidly the past hour from 80% to 20%.
        Mirrors are not keeping up since we're closed.

01:45 - Astronomical twilight.  We remain closed due to wind gusting
        to 30m/s. Wind trend the past few hours has been flat.

03:00 - Wind still gusting over limits (25m/s in past 10min)

05:00 - Downward trend the past hour, but still gusts over the limits.

06:00 - Looking promising to open soon...

06:10 - Wind below limits, we're opening up.  

06:16 - Pointing star

06:29 - UVa_BCD_LUCI, J0133.  Seeing is 1.5" but getting a little
        better.  First acq image object was too faint to centroid.
        Increased exptime.  Trying... Very hard to see, but got an OK
        centroid.  Noticed PI used the wrong camera (N1.8 instead of
        N3.75) making this harder.  Will change scripts for all
        objects)

07:12 - Problems with grating not stabilizing at right tilt.  Tweaking
        tilt, didn't work. Changed camera, then it worked. 

07:30 - Running science exposures.  Increased DIT to 240s because of
        the seeing.  Conditions aren't great, so we're mostly getting
        LUCI woken up and through startup issues (both instrument and
        operator).  Target is on the slit, but seeing is up to 2" at
        times.


08:20 - HD16017 Telluric for J0133

08:35 - Starting spec script. Saw grating stabilization fault again,
        but recovery was quicker.


08:38 - OSU_SN2014J - acquisition.  Failed.  Steve checking pointing.
        Once pointing checked, guide star is a double, screwing up
        WFS.  We're rotating field 180 and picking a new guide star
        POSANGLE=170.  A good star is NOMAD1 1596-0106875, but it
        doesn't stay in the guide patrol field for the large dithers
        used.

        Failed double guide star is NOMAD1 1597-010519.

        Next choice is NOMAD1 1597-0105153, R=15.9, which is at PA=-10
        but located well compared to the original and in range for
        dithering.

09:10 - acquiring, easy to see w/o differencing.  Offset dX=-22.5"
        Seeing during acq is 1.2", but variable...

09:18 - Starting spec script, Y setting.  Needed to ease it into the
        slit with 2 offsets (why did Olga have Ben use the N1.8
        camera?).

09:44 - Shell RIP.  Recovering... Exposure 3 compromised.

10:05 - Shell RIP again, recovering

10:11 - While waiting on shell RIP recovery, we figured out that our
        finder fooled us.  We are not on the supernova.  Rats!
        Re-acquiring... Seeing variable, 1.1 up to 2.2 or so later.

11:43 - Telluric (39UMa) - Y config - acq failed, checking pointing.

12:04 - Back to M82, zJ spectra
12:25 - Shell RIP... recovering  Seeing 2-2.5" during this sequence.

12:56 - Got 5 out 8, aborted to get some HK before twilight gets too bright

13:00 - Starting HK spectra. 

13:10 - Telluric Star - hobbled by grating setting failure on zJ
13:28 - Setting to HK for Telluric
13:32 - Attempting zJ - gave up, too many setting errors on grating tilt.


13:35 - Done, closing up.