Thursday, August 16th - First Ascent
The sky is beginning to clear here in Hawaii after the passing of hurricane Flossie. Yesterday, we once again packed our things at HP base camp at 10, 000 feet, this time making sure we remembered our sunglasses, sunscreen, gloves, beanies and coats. We were headed up the mount to the summit of Mauna Kea. The six-mile drive (another 3,000 feet in elevation) up to the summit held for us about 30 switchbacks over a rocky two-lane pass that went straight up the mountain. As we emerged onto the summit’s plateau, we saw the string of telescope domes rising up over the mountain pass.
Even with the cloud cover and the fog that obstructed some of the view of the rest of the island from the top of Mauna Kea, we were all blown away at the view from the summit. The clouds had begun to drop in elevation and bits of the blue sky were beginning to emerge. The tops of close peaks and cinder cones were visible through the passing fog, creating an eerie, but serene environment.
After making a quick pit stop at the ranger station to pick up snacks and some extra bottles of water, we were off to our first stop of the day, the Subaru Telescope. Dr. Saeko Hayashi, who had graciously set up for us an interview with the telescope’s director, Dr. Masahiko Hayashi, and offered to show us around the telescope facility, greeted us at the main building. We were lucky enough during our visit to the telescope to see the changing out of some of the telescope’s secondary instrumentation package. This is the point where the light that the primary mirror reflects and focuses. Normally, this light is then reflected to a third point where a detector is positioned – normally at the rear of the telescope. Subaru is the only 8 -10 meter class telescope that can place a large, widefield CCD detector at this position. This feature has allowed the Subaru telescope to image the youngest galaxies only twelve billion light years away (for more information, see http://www.naoj.org/Pressrelease/2005/12/21/index.html). Some of the telescope facility’s engineers orchestrated the delicate “change-out” process with the help of robotic technology. Even assisted by the robotic system this is a very dangerous exercise for he technicians as they work 60’+ above the observatory floor.
The interview with Subaru’s director went wonderfully. His passion for Astronomy and the progress being made at the facility was made clear by his explanation of the technology Subaru was bringing to the astronomical world. He even explained some of the processes of the facility in Japanese that may become part of our website for our international visitors.
After capturing movement of the bright blue Subaru telescope, we moved onto our second stop of the day, the Gemini North Facility, right up the hill from Subaru. Scott Fisher, educational outreach officer at Gemini North, greeted us and helped us to get acquainted with our filming environment by giving us a quick tour. We entered the dome as they began doing some movements on the telescope and Scott pointed out to us some of the unique characteristics of the telescope. In particular, the telescope features the ability to change instruments very quickly by mounting multiple instruments on the telescope itself. Compared to other telescopes, this convenience helps observers to get readings during nights when the weather or observing conditions suddenly change. As sunset approached, we set up a two-camera view of the opening of the dome as well as used the plan-o-cam to capture the spectacular view from below the great telescope. We definitely captured the passion and the advancement of astronomy through our interviews and our visits to the two observatories. Both gave us perspective on where we are in our current understanding of the universe and gave us predictions on what to look forward to in the future of astronomy.
