LBT OSU/RC Partner Observing Notes
Date: 2015 January 24 UTC (Night 8 of 9)
Observers: Paul Martini, Suk Sien Tie (OSU)
Support Astronomer: Barry Rothberg (remote) 
Telescope Operator: Steve Allanson

SUMMARY:

Start of night: partly cloudy, coming in from the South, seeing about 2" 
Completed OSU_N925 d, e and OSU_ETG, and 4/5 of OSU_CLASH mac1149. 
Seeing stayed close to 2" until 8UT, then dropped to about 1". 
Skies were fairly clear for 4/5 OSU_CLASH observations, but a new 
set of clouds came in around 11-11:30UT and basically wiped out the 
rest of the night. 

Took calibrations at the start of the night, then a few more at the end. 

Observing Notes: 

All times are UTC unless otherwise noted

00:15	Red grating calibrations: slitflats-rg.cal, grpixflats_r.cal
	Note: had to run 'red expdone' during grpixflats_r.cal

00:52	Opening up, ambient and mirror agree within about a degree. 

01:30	Can barely see pointing star due to thick clouds. 

01:34	Sending acquisition for G191B2B, about 2-3 mag of clouds, seeing 
 	about 2" 

01:49	Observations of G191B2B in dual grating, red grating 
	avg seeing 1.8" on GCS, 1.7" on DIMM

02:15	Moving to N925d 

02:31 	Starting observation of N925d. Seeing 1.8", transparency is poor 
	Transparency has slightly improved, as has the seeing (now 1.5") 
	Lots of emission lines clearly visible. 
	Took a 4th 1200s exposure due to poor conditions.

04:02	Moving to N925e
	Need to slightly tweak PA by -0.5 

04:26	Started observation of N925e. Seeing 2", transparency somewhat better 
	Got this error message before first exposure: 

DONE: nimgs NUMEXP_B=1 NUMEXP_R=1
>> PARTNER OSURC
** ERROR: Command 'PARTNER OSURC' timed out after 60 seconds
** Abort, Retry, or Ignore? > r
** Retrying command 'PARTNER OSURC'
>> PARTNER OSURC

	The retry was successful. 

04:55	Conditions getting a little worse -- about 0.5-1 mag of clouds 
	Lots of emission lines in first image

05:31	Guide star dropped 2 mag! 

05:42	Acquisition of OSU_ETG NGC3245
	Unwrapping azimuth

05:46	Restarting acquisition of ngc3245-HA-3.5+1.0

05:56	Starting ngc3245.obs, a little clearer, seeing about 1.5" 

06:28	Clouds passing through, seeing up to 1.9" 
	
08:06 	Doing another, given poor conditions, although now seeing is 
	ranging from 1.3-1.5

08:37	Seeing is back up to 1.6" 

08:38	Moving to Feige 34
	
08:47	Observing Feige 34 in dual grating and dual prism mode 
	Seeing 1.4, the system to the south is starting to appear

09:10 	Moving to MACS1149, seeing is 1.2", skies still mostly clear 
	for the moment

09:24	Starting observations of MACS1149, skies seem clear and dark, 
	Seeing between 1.2 and 1.4

10:06	Skies staying clear, seeing 1", some objects clearly visible in slits 

10:30	Seeing about 1.1", transparency still good. 

11:00	Seeing about 1.1", transparency has degraded by about 0.5 mag over 
	the past half hour (affecting 3rd obs) 

11:14	Transparency down by about 1mag now. 

11:30 	Aborting after 4/5 exposures completed.

11:36 	Moving to pks1302_1950.acq

11:39	Checking pointing 

11:43	Transparency has gotten worse, can barely see 12.5mag guide star

11:46	Going to Feige 34 

11:54	Starting dual grating, dual prism observations of Feige 34
	Seeing 1", transparency a little better here in the north

12:15	Seeing increased to 1", transparency varying by 0.5 mag
	Going back to try pks1302_1950.acq again 
	Still can't see guide star

12:20	Going to zenith to take some calibrations while we wait to 
	see if conditions improve
 	execMODS mods.8.macs1149.cal
	execMODS bias3K.cal
	execMODS imflats_r_z.cal

13:00	Can barely see stars, so closing up for the night.