Thursday, June 16, 2005
Daylight Jupiter Blues
It's 30 minutes to Jupiter's closest approach and all I see is cloud cloud cloud. This morning, in a burst of optimism, I packed my big binoculars and portable 50 mm refractor and took them to work.
Of course it bucketed down. At lunch time I wandered around outside the building to see if there was a good vantage point, but all I could see was cloud. It was like this last year, for the naked eye occultation of Venus. A beautiful clear day the day before, thick cloud on the day.
15 minutes to closest approach. I wander off down the corridor while Rebecca finishes the lymphocyte proliferation assay. At least that is working correctly. I press my face to the window at the edge of the corridor.
Then the Moon appears from behind a cloud. Amazingly a whole chunk of clear sky has just framed Selene. I try to see Jupiter with my unaided eye, but through the grimy glass I just can't spot it. I rush back to Rebecca to check the results (very interesting) help her clean up (this was her first time running the assay by herself, and things went well), then pop outside with my binoculars to look at the Moon.
Cloud. I wait 5 minutes and am rewarded with a 30 second break, I swing up the binoculars ... and I see it, a bright dot just above and to the left of the Moon, I try and see Jupiter unaided ... but the cloud swallows the Moon again. Still, I am jubilent, daytime Jupiter at last!
Back to the lab, I continue doing some marking. Cloud outside. I pop out onto the walkway joining the North and South Buildings and suddenly there is another cloud break and the Moon is with us once again. I pop back into the lab, grab the binoculars and drag Francis the PhD student out with me. For a few glorious moments we see Jupiter floating above the Moon in the binocs. Looking up, I see another break coming. I rush in and assemble the scope, and call up some folks in the level 5 labs. Drag the scope onto the walkway, line up the Moon ... and there it is a pale banded ball visible in the daytime sky. Francis sees it too. The others make it to the walkway, and the cloud comes over again. We wait awhile, another break, one of the honours students sees Jupiter through the scope fleetingly, and then the cloud comes again.
We wait, the cloud stays, the level 5 folks go back. I pack up. Francis and I share the warm glow of seeing something special under difficult circumstances.
Then I go back to marking.
Walking home from the train, I see Jupiter, now far past the Moon, peaking through the cloud, playing hide and seek. But I won't play, I gotcha under far more difficult conditions today.
Of course it bucketed down. At lunch time I wandered around outside the building to see if there was a good vantage point, but all I could see was cloud. It was like this last year, for the naked eye occultation of Venus. A beautiful clear day the day before, thick cloud on the day.
15 minutes to closest approach. I wander off down the corridor while Rebecca finishes the lymphocyte proliferation assay. At least that is working correctly. I press my face to the window at the edge of the corridor.
Then the Moon appears from behind a cloud. Amazingly a whole chunk of clear sky has just framed Selene. I try to see Jupiter with my unaided eye, but through the grimy glass I just can't spot it. I rush back to Rebecca to check the results (very interesting) help her clean up (this was her first time running the assay by herself, and things went well), then pop outside with my binoculars to look at the Moon.
Cloud. I wait 5 minutes and am rewarded with a 30 second break, I swing up the binoculars ... and I see it, a bright dot just above and to the left of the Moon, I try and see Jupiter unaided ... but the cloud swallows the Moon again. Still, I am jubilent, daytime Jupiter at last!
Back to the lab, I continue doing some marking. Cloud outside. I pop out onto the walkway joining the North and South Buildings and suddenly there is another cloud break and the Moon is with us once again. I pop back into the lab, grab the binoculars and drag Francis the PhD student out with me. For a few glorious moments we see Jupiter floating above the Moon in the binocs. Looking up, I see another break coming. I rush in and assemble the scope, and call up some folks in the level 5 labs. Drag the scope onto the walkway, line up the Moon ... and there it is a pale banded ball visible in the daytime sky. Francis sees it too. The others make it to the walkway, and the cloud comes over again. We wait awhile, another break, one of the honours students sees Jupiter through the scope fleetingly, and then the cloud comes again.
We wait, the cloud stays, the level 5 folks go back. I pack up. Francis and I share the warm glow of seeing something special under difficult circumstances.
Then I go back to marking.
Walking home from the train, I see Jupiter, now far past the Moon, peaking through the cloud, playing hide and seek. But I won't play, I gotcha under far more difficult conditions today.
# posted by Ian Musgrave @ 9:57 pm 
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