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(cba:news) SS UMi, V1974 Cyg, V503 Cyg, V4743 Sgr, V1223 Sgr (Joe Patterson) [2012-05-31T03:05:35Z]

Hi Tom et al.,
We have beautiful weather here at Kitt Peak. Second night of 10 night run. This is my last night - Helena will take all the rest, along with 2-4 Columbia students she's inculcating into the arcana of research.
Our two main targets will be SS UMi (start of night) and V1974 Cyg (after midnight). So you might endeavor to get SS UMi late in your night (as I think has been your custom). It would be GREAT to get European help on SS UMi; I realize the runs will be short, but it'll help with alias issues.
V503 Cyg is the other ER UMa star (in my opinion) beginning its observing season. Time to fire up on that guy with long runs.
It's also dead-on perfect season for V4743 Sgr (hard, fascinating target) and V1223 Sgr (easy target - only DQ Her star secularly spinning down since discovery). I'd love to work with some data on these stars. We have a lot of students now, and will be capable of a great improvement in our conversion rate of data to scientific papers
It was a great Big Bear meeting... and I'll write about it, and some changes ahead, after I get back home on Saturday. 

joe
Oh yeah - it's FINALLY time to declare season's end for our various stars at 9 hours (RZ LMi, ER UMa, BK Lyn). Better take a lesson from Icarus. 



On 5/30/2012 10:46 PM, Tom Krajci wrote:

I see that the cloud is drifting south slowly...may try opening soon.

Las Cruces is south of me...so you may see that happening in an hour or so.


On 5/30/2012 8:22 PM, Bill Stein wrote:

Tom - I am under the same smoke conditions here too and I do not plan to
observe.

Bill
Las Cruces, NM

-----Original Message-----
From: cba-chat-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:cba-chat-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx] On
Behalf Of Tom Krajci
Sent: Wednesday, May 30, 2012 7:39 PM
To: chat CBA
Subject: (cba:chat) Astrokolkhoz - on weather hold

Smoke plume from the forest fire in the Gila is over me.  Sun is safe to
look at with unaided eye...blood red.  Bright moon tonight to shine on the
smoke.  Looks like wind may keep that plume over me for the rest of the
night.  Not good for taking data.  (But the smoke is not at ground level, so
it's not a local health hazard at this time.)

I won't run scopes unless I'm sure that the plume will move away.  I'll
monitor for an hour or so after sunset...but not much longer because I'm
tired from running the last few days, and repairing/troubleshooting.

These smoke clouds are amazing IR filters that block most visible light.  If
I stand in the shadow of a tree, and then step out where the sun is (faintly
visible) to my eyes...the skin on my face tells me that a strong IR source
is blasting away.

The fire is now the largest in New Mexico history, and 0% contained.
Smoke will be generated for weeks to come.  How large will it get, and what
will stop it?...people, or monsoon rains in 6 - 8 weeks?
<http://www.inciweb.org/incident/2870/>

--
-------------------------------------------
Tom Krajci
Cloudcroft, New Mexico
http://picasaweb.google.com/tom.krajci

Center for Backyard Astrophysics (CBA)
https://cbastro.org/ CBA New Mexico

American Association of Variable Star
Observers (AAVSO): KTC http://www.aavso.org/
-------------------------------------------




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