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Date
Name
Affiliation
Other Observers
Instrument
Hours Observed
Hours Lost
Reason
Observing Program
12/19/2025
William Keel
University of Alabama
2 cats
ARC CCD
11
0.5
Connection Issues
Giant AGN-ionized clouds. Focus 315512, guider focus 29000. During evening twilight sky flats, I lost the RAdmin connection to both computers. It came back a couple of minutes later, but the dome was auto-closing (so I waited on it and reopened). That sounds like a glitch with extreme prejudice - a new one on me. (This was not just a local network hiccup, because I kept communicating with CT on another computer). Images were so good at the start of the night that I dared not touch the focus at 315512. I managed to lose 30 minutes to the dreaded feline-assisted malfunction. If I don't see Smallest Cat about to jump under my arm onto the keyboard, I still fall for "touch any key to abort exposure". Where does "save last image" go from ACE or DS9? I can't find them on either computer
12/16/2025
Billy Quarles
ETAMU
None
CCD
10
0
No problems to report
TESS EBs, Found focus at 315500. clear skies
12/15/2025
William Keel
University of Alabama
2 cats
ARC CCD
11.5
0
No problems to report
AGN-ionized clouds. Focus 316000 (but sort of rubbery during the night). Guider focus 26250. Guider settings x,y speeds 1, angle 0, aggressiveness 1 in each axis.
12/14/2025
Todd Vaccaro
Ball State University
n/a
ARC
7
6
Clouds
Eclipsing binary and variable stars. First half of night was cloudy and couldn't get faint targets; cleared by midnight MST and was able to get V and R flats in the morning. I'm not exactly sure what CCD I was using, it said ARC, but is this a different one from CT or the old one fixed? I don't know what gain and read noise to use for reductions.
12/08/2025
Gary Henson
ETSU
none
Spectrograph
7
0
No problems to report
Spectra of Active Be Star ; focus seemed a bit loose, drove it to zero with encoder reset. Focus now around 700,000 + All else Ok, telescope autoguided well for ~4 hours straight.
12/08/2025
Gary Henson
ETSU
none
Spectrograph
7
0
No problems to report
Spectra of Active Be Star, focus seemed slack, drove to zero which reset encoders. Telescope focus now in neighborhood of 700000 + Very good night and telescope autoguided for nearly 4 hours non-stop without issues.
12/05/2025
Martha A. Leake
Valdosta State University
none
CCD
0
12
Other
Cannot observe tonight and was not able to find observers. I'm a CCD user and that equipment is apparently not available. Have not opened. Weather not an issue, but bright moon tonight.
12/02/2025
Gary Henson
ETSU
none
Spectrograph
6
0
No problems to report
Spectroscopy of Active Be Star
12/01/2025
Gary Henson
ETSU
none
Spectrograph
10
0
No problems to report
Spectra of active Be Star, all systems working very well tonight.
11/27/2025
Ken Watanabe
Florida Gulf Coast University
Jonathan Zielinski, Xavier Baquero-Iglesias
CCD
0
8
Equipment Failure
CCD down. Temperature won't go down. Also dangerous clouds in the area.
11/22/2025
Ken Watanabe
Florida Gulf Coast University
Jonathan Zielinski
CCD
0
8
Equipment Failure
CCD is still broken. temperature won't go down.
11/13/2025
Isabelle Adams
Agnes Scott College
None
Spectroscope
9.5
0
No problems to report
Everything went quite smoothly, and I had no issues.
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