Night Lights

Here is something you don't see very often. The lights on inside the dome of the Hale Telescope at night.

I have always liked this shot because of the mix between moonlight (illuminating the dome), starlight (can you spot Orion and Taurus?) and the interior lights. It is the only photo that I have taken ever to appear on the cover of a phone book

This picture was taken in the fall of 2004 during some engineering time. The lights were on while some new equipment was being prepared for use later that night.

I have uploaded this photo at a higher resolution than I normally do. Click on the image to see it in a much larger size.

Top Honors for Astronomer Richard Ellis

Congratulations to Richard Ellis, Steele Professor of Astronomy at Caltech and former Palomar Observatory director, who was just chosen by the Royal Astronomical Society's highest honor -- their Gold Medal.

From Royal Astronomical Society's citation:

... in recognition of his outstanding personal research and leadership in astronomy that make him one of the most influential British astronomers of the last three decades.

During his career, Richard Ellis has played a key role in cosmology and astronomical instrumentation. In the 1990s he used the Hubble Space Telescope to solve the 'faint blue galaxy' problem, identifying the transformation of irregular galaxies into more quiescent systems. Since then he has made major progress in understanding why galaxies are grouped into the 'Hubble sequence' and in recent years has used gravitational lensing to find some of the most distant objects in the universe, with redshifts from 6 to 10.

Prior to Caltech, Richard held posts including Director of the Institute of Astronomy in Cambridge and Professor of Astronomy at Durham University. During this time he led the 2-degree Field Galaxy Redshift Survey (2dFGRS), the first large-scale (and highly
successful) cosmology project. Subsequently he has gone on to lead a team proposing a wide-field spectrograph for the Subaru telescope on Hawaii that would be the natural successor to 2dFGRS and is playing a key role in the efforts to build a 30-m telescope.

Richard is the co-author of 340 refereed papers receiving more than 41000 citations, with three of his papers each having more than 1000 citations, giving him a publication record of immense stature. With all-round vision, science leadership and a rich legacy of contributions to cosmology, he is a very worthy recipient of the Gold Medal.

Mountain Medical Aid

We would like to thank the members of the Palomar Mountain Volunteer Fire Department and other rescue workers who responded to a medical aid call at the Observatory yesterday.

Not being able to help, at least I was able to capture some pictures of firetrucks with the dome of the Hale Telescope.




Mercy Air was called in to get the patient to the hospital quickly, that gave me a chance to catch the helicopter, Hale Telescope dome and a halo around the sun all in one shot.


We certainly hope for a speedy recovery for the patient and are glad to have such fine help close at hand.

Palomar History Photo of the Week - Our Ship Comes In

Let's try to catch up on our History Photo of the Week by posting a few shots from January 13, 1936 when our ship came in.

Here is the Nevadan with a tug boat bringing it into the Port of Los Angeles in San Pedro, California:

On board in a cargo hold is a delivery from Baldwin-Southwark Corp in Eddystone, Pennsylvania of an item made by Babcock & Wilcox Company.

The big round crate contains what will be the mirror cell for the 200-inch mirror. Just to give you a sense of scale you can see a portion of two cars in the hold on the left.

It was removed from the ship and lifted on to a trailer for transportation to Caltech:


Here is the arrival of the trailer as it is backed in from California Boulevard and into the optical shop at Caltech:

Palomar Sunset - January 7, 2011

Tonight's sunset from the catwalk of the 200-inch Hale Telescope:




Click to embiggen to make it easier to spy the crescent moon at the top of the picture.

Observatory Open

The headline says it all. We are now back on our normal winter visiting hours of being open to the public from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. daily.

See "Acquainted with the Night" in Palm Springs Next Week

A new documentary film, Acquainted with the Night, will be playing at the Palm Springs International Film Festival next week.

According to Michael McNamara, the film's director "The documentary examines night time around the world, and features amazing photography of night phenomena, time lapse photography and Aurora Borealis, and also looks at the consequences and effects of light pollution."

It is not as yet scheduled to be broadcast on U.S. TV so catching it at the film festival may be your only chance to see it for a while. It will be showing:

Tuesday January 11, 12.00pm -- Annenberg Auditorium

Thursday January 13, 12:00pm -- Camelot Theatres

Saturday January 15, 4:00pm -- Palm Canyon Theatre

Check out the trailer below:

You can also watch it directly here on YouTube.

Wednesday: Still Closed

The latest word is that there is some snow/ice lodged on the upper part of the dome of the 200-inch telescope in a place that can't easily be cleared. Since falling snow/ice poses a potential danger to visitors the observatory will be closed until it looks safe.

It is hoped that some direct sunlight today will help to clear the problem.

Out Giving Talks & A New Exhibit

Here are two pieces of news that are not for those local to Southern California.

Later this month I will be speaking about current research taking place at Palomar Observatory at the Seattle Astronomical Society's annual banquet. The talk will be on Sunday, January 30 and the details are on their website.

On Monday, January 10 the Rakow Research Library at the Corning Museum of Glass will be opening a new exhibit: Mirror to Discovery The 200-inch Disk and the Hale Reflecting Telescope at Palomar. The exhibit runs until October 30, 2011 - so there is plenty of time to plan your trip to see it. I will be heading to Corning, NY to see the exhibit as I am giving an invited talk there about Palomar Observatory on March 24. The date is one day short of the 77th anniversary of the casting of the first, failed, 200-inch disk. This gigantic piece of glass became the centerpiece for the museum and it still on display.

Hopefully some of the people who follow this blog, but are far from Palomar Observatory will be able to attend.

Sorry, We're Closed

Yes, we are still closed to the public.

Remember you can check on the observatory's status by calling our Public Information Recording: (760) 742-2119.