Here is a response i wrote to an email I just received asking me if I was opening up the observatory tonight. It's Saturday and cloudy out so there is nothing to view.
There might be a few typos in my reply below. Not a perfect letter or post.
Briefly I usually don't open up HJRO when its cloudy out. And sometimes I have opened up for a planned group visit when it was cloudy, but it's better to visit when it's clear out. We can't see through the clouds with the telescopes. And the tour might be a little boring for most without being able to observe. I could I suppose open up once in a while and give an equipment tour or talk, but I try to focus on having the chance to show people the sky as well.
This last week I was at the observatory and had it open Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Each time I opened someone asked me if I'd be open the next day. As it was clear I opened up for others. You can imagine that can take a toll on a persons schedule, being at HJRO four days in a row. And I'm a volunteer. If I'm open so much during clear days, you can see why I'm a but reluctant to open up on a cloudy one during the same week.
We only have three authorized key keepers for the observatory, for security reasons and I usually have the most free schedule and live close by, so I'm already opening up 90 percent of the time. As you can imagine, I'm reluctant to commit to opening up on cloudy days/nights, when I already open up so much on clear nights.
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(more details in copy of letter below)
Sometimes I'll announce if the observatory will be open on my blog Hjrobservatory.blogspot.com
I need to work on announcing that more before I open. (Sometimes I'm in a rush and don't post on this blog I'm open especially since my Blogpress stopped working on my iPhone.) You can still call the observatory phone or email me when it's clear out. I'll chat with anyone and answer the requests and questions even when it's cloudy, but right now I don't open up when it's cloudy.
Last week I was open every night from Monday through Thursday. There was a common trait of course. People were asking me to open and there were clear skies.
Right now the skies are overcast. I have not made it a practice to open when it's cloudy, because I usually want to be able to observe visually and show others the stars, planets, moon, etc.
We can't see through clouds. The telescope can see some objects through thin clouds or through "sucker holes", clear parts of the sky in partly cloudy skies.
Sometimes we open up for a small group ahead of time, preschedules openings like club scout groups, If it's cloudy we simply give them a tour and pray for some clear spots to appear in the sky to hopefully observe a little. We have often cancelled group visits, when the sky isn't clear and tried scheduling an alternate date.
Should we give tours in bad overcast weather?
This email request today along with a phone call I received brings to mind a question of where should the observatory go or what should be our future goals be? Should we try to plan bad weather presentations? I could perhaps open up even in bad weather and give tours, but there is little to do or show. I suppose I could make up a list and show equipment and perhaps do other presentations. But what would those presentations be? And would people want to come even when it's cloudy to a very small observatory. Our site is not suited to av presentations as the observatory is small. We usually give small presentations showing things off the iPad, or computer screen. Sometimes we show a video feed from the telescope as well on a small monitor.
As I'm a volunteer, I have to pick my days to open up HJRO carefully. I have limited time to be there, so I choose the best clear nights when I'm available. Some clear nights there are other astronomy events and I may attend those, but this only affects maybe 30 percent of the clear nights. I often will sacrifice a trip to a better darker site for the chance to open up HJRO for others and because it's close by. I feel that I should try to have it open as much as possible on clear nights and sometimes during a clear day for solar.
There will perhaps be more goals of our being open longer in the future on clear nights for Internet broadcasting as well. But I'm not sure how that will be possible without affecting the time I would open up for local visitors. Things may get more complicated, with some plans to show kids in Australia for example the nit sky up here over the Internet. This is one goal proposed by one of our main core volunteers, it will be interesting to see how that may work out, or not work out. Scheduling might make that goal difficult.
Some other dreams which are just dreams right now.
If we had a bigger building, perhaps a display and multimedia room. Like a control room with a mini planetarium or something, right next door to the observatory, I'd have much more to show the public and could have a program that didn't rely on good weather.
I thought, for example, a room that could seat up to 30 people, a small building with multimedia projection and perhaps even a small telescope museum display area with up to 8 telescopes on display would be a good goal. Such a building would have to be close to the observatory. And we'd have to find funding permissions and build it. And there is a drainage field requirement a certain amount of space for lawns around the observatory due to the massive size of parking lots and cement nearby. I don't know if we could get support and funding for this goal and it seems very unlikely right one. We have school facilities, but teachers are not paid to work nits and have a life and other things to do, so I don't think we could open up a classroom for some kind of cloudy night program/presentation. It kind of leaves the observatory in a kind of limbo in a sense. Like a real small one room schoolhouse, to small for a class and without a teacher. Since we are volunteers and not teachers working for the school district it's easier to show adults the observatory than school children. In a sense once you graduate from high school you get better access to the schools observatory as a visitor than when you were a student.
I have thought a little bit on what could be offered as a program to do something when the sky is cloudy. Some have suggested a fixed schedule being open would help others plan; that is true. But I haven't come up with a serious plan as to when we'd be open, and what we would present. Much of what we'd present would be cyber stuff perhaps on the web available from the home. Maybe some PowerPoint or photo shows. We could show video I suppose but the small observatory would only seat a few people for that kind of presentation. Perhaps questions and answer sessions and speaker presentations would be good, but the small observatory is only fit for small groups. There is another problem. That is people will say they are interested and say they will show up, even club members, then because they are busy or distracted, they won't show up. Things happen and they of course put astronomy way back on the back burner. Sometimes I spend an hour or two waiting for a visitor, of course I'll observe while I wait, and they won't show up. So that makes me reluctant to expand a schedule or try to setup times when conditions are even worse out - a cloudy night.
Presentation sessions at places like HFCC college's planetarium need to have volunteers and equipment, videos present shows to the public as well. This may be something that would require more commitment than members in the FAAC club are willing to do. (And we'd be hamstrung by only having three key keepers to open up.)
90 percent of the time I'm the one to open up the observatory and let the public inside. This due to security concerns. There are three key keepers, one is busy with a home business, Tim Dey. The other is in Northville, and has his own observatory. George K. And then, there is me. I'm single so I have more time. Club members know I'm retired as well and at times I will open and stay open very late at night. When other club members, visitors show up.
I can give a 30 minute tour and talk about the history and equipment very easily without sky watching. But I think most would be bored with this.
My goal is to have every visitor look through e biggest telescope we have on site, when they visit. My reason for this is that is what I'd want to do if I visited an observatory. If you can't look through the scope, maybe you won't get a chance to return and maybe you'll never see the view. I went to an observstory, Perkins observatory in Delaware Ohio and when I was there conditions were not perfect and the view would have been bad through the biggest telescope. They had a 32 inch telescope there. Because conditions were bad they didn't let people look through the telescope. They had tons of stuff, a library, computers, displays and a nice tour, so there was a lot to see. The sky was pretty good however and they let us look through a 14 inch obsession Dobsonian telescope. It was cool, but I left wishing I could have looked through the big telescope. Don't get me wrong, the tour of the observatory was really cool, they opened up the huge dome and cold air rushed in. It felt like they were opening up a huge hanger in a Star Wars movie on the ice planet or something like that. Really cool. But I realized I felt disappointed because I didn't get a chance to look through the big telescope, even at a fuzzy less than perfect image.
When I realized that I felt that way, I thought one of my goals should be to insure ever visitor gets a chance to look through our c14 when they visit. Even if we are doing photography when they arrive, the visitor should get priority and we should stop our photography for a while to let them look up. So that is one of my goals, for night viewing. To show every visitor something through the biggest telescope.
I consider the observatory to be primarily a visual place for people to look through the telescope. We have photographic capability and can photograph the sky through the telescope and also take pictures or video of visitors if they want us to and present a number of photo or video memories of your visit.
I need to work on a Menu list of features we can offer, as we have about 20 things we can do. But I rarely have opened up during a cloudy day for visitors. Maybe this should change and maybe I should offer a fixed schedule and program so people can plan a visit?
Let me know what you think about these thoughts. Do you want to stop by to see the inside of a dome and no stars, planets, moon, etc. Just to look at the inside and maybe see a couple of telescopes? Maybe I should work up a plan for a cloudy night tour for folks.
Greg
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