Another MagAO-X run in the books. Overall a successful one too. We got lots of new stuff working, and had several very good nights with some exciting discoveries. Great work folks. Now get to work on your data and maybe you’ll get a PhD.
This was one of the few times, however, that I’m feeling personally let down by Cerro Manqui. Our mountain usually comes through for me, just when it’s time to do my observations the skies clear and the stars still. But this time I only got one really good shot at my target (out of four planned observations), and the infamous last night included my time. I guess this is the problem with doing the things that require everything to be perfect — that’s hard to do.
As has been noted, the animals were pretty entertaining the last few weeks.
The Fox and Magellan
Cleanroom Vizzies were hit or miss this run, but on our last work day one made an appearance.
Burrows up to no good.
The addition of a cat is a major development. I really want to know the story — I assume it involves an epic journey.
It looked like she was headed towards the Bodega.
These aren’t condors, they’re people.
Look what I found at the summit. #10-32 rack screws.
One last sunset.
Now that we routinely leave MagAO-X here and set up for remote experiments, it has become traditional for me to put in a goodbye photo so we can remember how we left it.
This time there’s a twist. I set up a webcam on our workstation pointed at MagAO-X. At least when the lights are on it will give us a little view of home away from home.
Time to start working on the next sticker
I watched Fifth Element on the plane ride down. It contains a great way to describe an Empanada.
If you take a step back and really think about it, the way we celebrate birthdays is pretty weird. Wearing a conical paper hat? Lighting a small fire atop some food and then immediately blowing it out? Sitting awkwardly while everyone in a room sings to you? If you think a little too hard about birthday traditions, they’re all a bit strange.
Maybe that’s how we tried to justify the ritual we put Matthijs through on his birthday. Sure, craning and cart-building and wrapping a one-ton instrument in saran wrap and emergency blankets is a little weird. But hear me out: if you look at the big picture, it’s not so much more bizarre than party hats and birthday candles. Plus, I’m certain what we unwrapped today was orders of magnitude more expensive than any birthday present any of us has ever received.
I’m talking to you from the perspective of the day crew, who went to bed while the night crew braved the last few (not ideal) hours on-sky at the telescope. Laird, Elena, Matthijs and I were up bright and early to begin the process of moving MagAO-X from the Nasmyth platform down the hill to its temporary home in the cleanroom. This involves hard hats, steel toes, and a whole lot of bolts.
all smiles tbh i wish our hard hats had a chin strapMagAO-X looking like it just ran a marathon
We had gone over the procedure with the LCO staff the day before, so the day’s craning operations went smoothly. Before we knew it we were loading the instrument into the cleanroom, followed by the legs and the electronics rack. After some more craning, cart disassembly, and an unexpected battle between the instrument’s caster wheels and the cracks in the floor, by 3pm we were ready to pass the baton back to the day crew.
a beautiful gift ready to be unwrappedhmm, it feels like she’s missing something
They expertly finished what we started, cabling up all our electronics, including the DMs, in record time.
“How do a bunch of guys . . . build all this?” “The same way [people] built the pyramids, and the Great Wall of China.” “Yeah. The aliens helped them.”
After this, a few of us are staying an extra day to set up remote ops so we can keep working until we see each other again at LCO for 2025B. We’ll be far away from each other, but we promise not to be distant.
I regret to inform you, dear readers, that things did not get better. This is not a happy story. Your brave AO operators do not triumph over the atmosphere, because… well it’s a natural phenomenon with a mean streak. We don’t pull an underdog move, miraculously rally, and through the power of friendship get phenomenal data at the last second. We limped towards dawn and the day crew takeover. The last night of the run was a wash, and honestly we’re glad it’s over.
When AO is on the telescope, you don’t get red on this plot…
Now that you’re adequately disappointed for us, here are some good things that happened today:
The sunset was beautiful!
I have a soft spot for the dome reflecting pink cloud glow.
2. The vegan ate well!
A meal so beautiful it needed it’s own fancy plate.
3. Baby viscachas are still very cute!
Hey! Did you know it’s the hoppy holiday today?If you want it enough, you’ll find him.
4. Another Laird theory proved!
During the course of our bright observations tonight, where we were attempting some engineering despite the seeing, we noticed that our performance was way worse than it should have been… when pointing to the south, where the control room is. Camtip (the champ) bounced like a pingpong ball. Then when we point to the north, away from the telescopes, suddenly smooth sailing. Camtip a beautiful steady ring. (Not useless!) A more detailed proof probably forthcoming, but initial evidence indicates AO doesn’t like the telescope pointing at 210-240 degrees. One more thing to think about when picking targets.
The plots to look at are the circular wind plot against the areal view of where the telescopes point.
5. We got Easter candy!
The bunny (or should I say vizzy?) delivery is always a treat, and which treat changes year to year.
Thank you LCO for making the holiday special!
6. It’s Matthijs birthday!
Well, at midnight it was. He went down the hill before we had a chance to sing him a midnight birthday song in the control room, being a responsible day crew member. So happy birthday to our only postdoc! Hope you have some downtime from your rigging intro to enjoymorepuzzles.
That’s a face that says “yum”sunrise caught by Sebastiaan
Given that the atmosphere basically booted us out the door, we’re done here. The last photons of 25A were tallied up, as scattered as they might be. The sun has risen, the DM cables are tucked into bed, and the day crew will take it from here.
Night crew jumping one last hurdle on the way to bed.Tucking cables getting tucked in.
As I successfully got every observer to use my daytime calibrated incoherent speckles tonight, I find this quote specifically apt :
“It’s wonderful when you can bring sparkle into people’s lives, especially under difficult circumstances.” — “Castle in the Sky”, 1986.
Song of the Day
Thanks Joseph for introducing me to the perfect song to encapsulate the night.
Much Strehl that once was is lost, for none now observe who remember it. It began with the forging of the Great Weather forecast. Dark clouds were given to the day crew, immortal, wisest and fairest of all beings. Dark clouds were also given to the astronomers, great miners and craftsmen of the starry nights. And nine, nine dark clouds were gifted to the race of the night crew, who above all else desire Strehl. For within these clouds was bound the strength and the will to govern all observers. But they were all of them deceived, for another weather pattern was made. Deep in the land of Chile, in the Fires of Mount Las Campanas, the Dark Lord Sauron forged a master pattern, and into this pattern he poured his cruelty, his malice and his will to dominate all astronomers.
The prediction of tonight.The reality of tonight.
One by one, the targets of MagAO-X fell to the power of the Clouds, but there were some who resisted. A last alliance of night crew and bright stars marched against the armies of the Chilean Clouds, and on the very slopes of Mount Las Campanas, they fought for the Strehl of MagAO-X.
And some things that should not have been forgotten were lost. History became legend. Legend became myth. And for two and a half thousand years (that’s how long it felt), high Strehls passed out of all knowledge. Until, when chance came, it ensnared another bearer.
During this night we struggled to keep the loop closed because our targets fluctuated in intensity by 5 magnitudes. This is an enormous amount. Eden bravely fought against changing conditions and sometimes she prevailed. But most of the time it was just a blood bath.
At the end of our 16th night everyone was slowly losing their minds. This led to a long string of making Maggie-O-X tell us jokes. Here is a fine selection of amazing jokes:
“Why did the AO system miss the coronagraph? Because it overdrove.
“What do you call an observer who is waiting for the sun? A dreamer.”
“Why are AO operators never scared? Because they already saw their own 3 AM face.”
“How many photons do you need for high Strehl? More than we got this night.”
“What is brown and sticky? A stick.”
“This night was not completely useless. It will forever serve as a bad example.”
“How do you talk to Italian ghosts? With a Luigi board.”
“What’s black and white and red all over? The tweeter.”
“No more adaptive optics for you!”
At least I saw a cat today.
I think I have added enough movie quotes to the blog post today. At least this music might give us hope for another night.
It’s very good to see you!! I was not here for your last run so I kind of missed you.
Happy despite the clouds.
This run in particular felt a bit weird because you’ve been here for such a loooong time. I met the first shift and the new team members (at least, new to me). Then I went on my off-week, came back, and you were STILL here! Haha!
I’m surprised by how much Asian stuff you bring in.
This time, you really outdid yourself with the amount of snacks you brought. I’ve tried them all, although I especially enjoy trying new things, especially the sweet ones. I’m glad you were able to bring merkén chips, and I hope you enjoyed them! They’re not spicy, but they’re very flavorful.
As I was saying, my shift started again, and I met your second group, the other new members (new to me, at least), and all the new snacks you brought! I loooooove those chocolate-covered blueberries, I kind of expected them, haha. But this new group brought more spicy stuff, and I tried that Tom Yum Snack Mix… it was waaaaaay too spicy, haha! It was so spicy I almost choked!
I took a bite and almost choked to death — it was fiery!
I hope you enjoy the cuchuflis and alfajores with manjar … very typical from here, just a bit of Chile for you.
The not fun part of your run is the clouds. With Rebeca, the new TO, were expecting the meteoblue got it wrong. But the clouds finally arrived and I am glad you have a plan for that, still, not fun for anybody. Buuut, before the clouds arrived we had a whoa moment!
So I went outside and my mind was “WHOA, I have to share this“, so I ran to you but I could not find the cohete word. But before I finally said rocket, everybody stood up from their seats and went to see this cloud that was moving so fast — it only took a few minutes to cross the sky. The picture actually turned out really nice. The very exciting phenomena that we saw was an OVNI (UFO) but probably a rocket.
The 3 Marías (Orion belt), the OVNI, Clay and Laird bogey.
During my shift off I saw a relatively old movie, but ChatGPT helped me find it: He’s Just Not That Into You. In it, there’s a line that goes something like: ‘Exceptional cases are just that, the rest of us are just the rule.’ At the end of the movie, it leaves me with an important reflection: to truly be the exception to the rule, one has to see the signs and, above all, believe them. That being said, I’m really grateful I got to meet you and share some fun moments together — getting to know you and learning about the amazing work you’re doing for astronomy.
One very fun song for you, its kind of old, sung by a little girl who is now a woman but for some rare reason the song is popular again – I couldn’t found the new official version sooooo here you have “Dubidubidu” by Christell one interview version.
