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Paul, that was only a private school party that visited La Palma then, but it has triggered a few other hairy moments i shared with Bob.
I remember that many of the hire cars then had completely bald tyres. On one occasion I ran over a large rock which smashed the oil sump, but was very grateful for a replacement car within half an hour. Another time myself and Bob were driving down fron Roque de los Muchachos one very foggy night early in the morning. The fog was so thick that Bob had to lean out the window and direct me in case I drove over the edge. As we rounded one corner a massive articulated truck rounded the bend on our side of the road, he had to to get his backend around! As it went by we realised it was the main body of the Liverpool Telescope being transported up the mountain!David
Had many enjoyable astro-adventures with Bob over the years. One of the most memorable was a couple of nights on the JKT in La Palma with sixth form students from Thomas Hardye’s School some 20 years ago. Here is Bob with staff and students with our host Javier Mendez at the JKT for a night’s imaging. The other shot is Bob outside the fire exit from our lodgings in a Spanish hacienda!
David
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I’ve wondered about the three fans fitted in the back of my RC10. I have never bothered to use them, do they serve a purpose when imaging?
I’ve never noticed a difference. Should they be switched on before a session to equalise temperature inside the tube?
Any RC owners welcome to comment!Thanks
DavidThis is my only record of anything moving through the field of view of a 28mm lens with 30s exp.
No rocket plume but a solitary aircraft at azimuth 239deg altitude 20deg at 23:18hr last night.
An unhappy Cosmic Girl returning to Newquay perhaps!? Imaged from East Devon.David
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I too was looking at Jupiter last night, and found this view very disconcerting!
Callisto now passing to the south of Jupiter and no longer transiting (South at top in image).David
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Update on this:
At least nineteen UK cameras caught the event – though some cameras were too close and got blinded, and others only caught a flash or a short part of the event. The event was also captured on several FRIPON/SCAMP cameras in the UK and France.
We’ve exchanged data with our colleagues in Canada and Europe and independent re-analysis is in progress. We take this approach to improve our confidence in the results. At this time it looks pretty promising and we’ll keep everyone informed.The fireball was picked up on the following UK cameras:
UK0002, UK0006, UK000H, UK0020, UK0024, UK0025, UK002V, UK003C, UK003M, UK003N, UK004X, UK0051, UK005V, UK0067, UK006S, UK003E, UK003F, UK003N and NLO.NLO video here:
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/30s0z7w0tlqtman1z5vrd/h?dl=0&rlkey=mj01p5vy56outzcglrbli9kxy
My daughter (non-astronomer) saw and picked up this this circular cloud during twilight on 21st April 21.31h BST moving eastwards across the sky. I guess it was also a fuel dump, but much more entertaining to suggest it was a toilet dump from the ISS!
David
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Hello Lyn,
Here is a whole disc image of the Sun taken this afternoon at 14:51h UT 19th April with a Solarscope 70mm
Cheers
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It’s looking increasingly likely that this is the missing Mond lens. It’s aperture is 17 cm and the focal length seems to be around 120cm when bringing a ceiling light into focus on a screen, which agrees with the original specification in NLO Handbook 1935. We have also found some numbers inscribed into the rim of the lens carrier but cannot read them clearly enough yet. The lens also fits comfortably into the front of the telescope tube. It does look like a petzval lens as you suggest Dennis, so my only query is was the original lens a petzval? We also believe that the accompanying guidescope is also original to the Mond. We believe it is the bottom section of a longer instrument which you see in the above photograph. I thought it just had its lens missing but now believe another longer brass tube holding the objective lens was located over the end of this short one.
Denis, we have a meeting on Friday to discuss and plan the re-instatement of the Mond telescope. We shall do a comparison of lenses then. We have been busy with a general refurbishment of the NLO entrance foyer, and the Mond is the next item on our to do list. I’ve just found this Jim Lockyer lantern slide of the Mond as new, taken at the Cooke works circa 1931. Interesting that Robert Mond paid £2171-5-9 for it which is £161,457 in today’s money.
Hi Denis, Do you know who was the author of this blog post? There is much useful information here and |I would like to credit him/her, but it seems anonymous as far as I can tell.
https://srmmt.blogspot.com/2005/01/sir-robert-mond-and-history-of-norman.html
Thanks David
Denis, that’s fantastic news if it’s true! Really opportune as well, as we are now starting to plan for the Mond’s installation.
If it helps, here is a picture of the other end of the 7″ lens tube. Thanks very much for that information. David
I gave a recent talk to the NLO History Group a few weeks ago showing a few scanned images from this lantern slide collection which gives an idea of what this project will involve: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O895siyOq7E&t=276s
David
Hello Denis,
I shall certainly suggest them as part of the project. We have recently started a refurbishment of the NLO foyer and the next project is to set up the Mond as a special exhibit. Thanks for those nice photos!
David
Caught this spectrum of SN2021hpr last night. It’s a 20 x120s stack with a Star Analyser 100, C9 and ASI183MM, but only problem was my calibration using the bright A0V star Izar looked oversaturated and I couldn’t get a useful calibration for one point alignment. Does the SN spectrum look about right?David
