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| Here's one that happened while we lived in southern Scotland in the 1980's. We lived in a small town in a sparsely populated area and the skies were dark enough to bump into the garden shed, not like here in south Devon where I can make a shadow with my hand, from a pavilion light 200 metres away. One night I took my 12.5" Dobsonian out to an isolated spot and spend some time observing springtime galaxies. The tube when upright was as tall as myself and I am 6' 0". When I had finished I packed it away with some effort and drove home. After taking a few turns, I couldn't help noticing that I was being followed and that when I parked in the drive, the car blocked me in. It turned out to be the local neighbourhood watch guy. Someone had reported that a man was in a field looking out of a can and they wondered if I was up to no good! When I told him what I had been doing he drove off relieved and amused. A can indeed! |
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| The late Pater George Coyne, catholic priest, astronomer and former director of the Vatican Observatory was taking photographic plates in the Castel Gandolfo observatory. suddenly, the door opened and some light shone into the dome. George Coyne shouted "shut the f**cking door you moron" or the like. The next day on the premises of Castel Gandolfo, he ran into Pope Jean Paul II, who took him aside "my son, we may have to work on your temper" ... |
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My favourite observing anecdote come from the Australian National University, based in Canberra. and owner/operater of telescopes on two mountain top sites in Australia; Mt Stromlo and Siding Spring observatory - both suffering huge damage in separate bush fires in the last 20 years. Various versions have been told over the years and even the precise location is in doubt (Mt Stromlo or Siding Spring) but it concerned a visiting Russian male astronomer and a young female astronomer working at separate telescopes on the same mountain top. The Russian astronomer was notorious for taking off much of his clothes on hot nights (of which there are many in Australia) and one particularly hot summer's night he disrobed down to nothing. After 30mins observing in this fashion, he noticed his counts were way down on his photometer. (it was a long time ago) Still in a state of advanced undress, he walked outside the observatory dome some distance to check on the weather only to discover that the cloud had, indeed, rolled in. He turned round to walk back to the dome only to see the female postdoc walking back from her telescope to the lodge, having already closed for the night. Unfortunately the Russian astronomer could not walk back to his dome without walking into the path of the oncoming postdoc, so he ran in the opposite direction in to the scrub until she was safely out of the way, before returning to the dome. The next morning [well midday] at the communal astronomer breakfast in the lodge, there were half a dozen astronomers in conversation about how such a good night had turned bad so quickly. The postdoc then ventured "Not only that, when I was walking back to the lodge I saw something I have never seen before" The Russian astronomer was horrified. The game was up. He would be shamed in front of his peers. The postdoc continued "Yes, just outside the 74inch telescope, I saw an albino kangaroo. But when it saw me it just ran into the bush" --------------------------------------------------------------------- This story "The Albino Kangaroo" has passed into professional astronomer folklore. It may not be true, and I do know at least one of the astronomers concerned and certainly know of the Russian astronomers dis-robing antics. The postdoc would have been well within her rights (and perhaps in this age, would have) called the more senior astronomer out for unacceptable practices. But what I like is that she gave him a warning without embarrassing him, and their story lives on. |
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| Brilliant story |
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From my numerous nights in the dome of our city's public observatory (1996-2006). In those years I was an (unemployed) dedicated telescope operator. A visitor wanted to know if it was possible to look through the telescope with his glasses still on. I told him that this was no problem. Dear visitor, just turn the knob near the eyepiece until a star shows its pointlike appearance. I also told him that there was another possibility to look through the telescope and glasses. We hold your glasses at the upper end of the telescope's tube while you watch through the eyepiece. Danny Caes, Ghent - Belgium (blue collar worker in automotive industry, read: logistics). |
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| Amazing stories! |
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In the dome of a public observatory it is almost always dark, perhaps a dim red light somewhere at the curved wall. One evening a visitor could not find the lower end of the telescope's tube to look through it (walking up the stairs toward the dome, after the main visit at the observatory's bar, brings a certain sensation of... well... an out-of-balance feeling). I must say that the telescope itself was a restored copper/gold colored refractor from Steinheil / T.Cooke and sons (read: a very old looking apparatus to watch the nocturnal sky above the city of Ghent, East-Flanders). Believe it or not, this person was looking through the turning knob to focus the eyepiece of the telescope. Did he observed a black hole? Sure. Danny C. from Ghent-Belgium. |
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| I used to teach my young daughter about the stars and one day I was a proud dad as she told me something about the constellations on view in the sky. It turned out that she hadn't learnt them from me at all but from Kermit the Frog in Muppit Treasure Island, interactive software I had bought for her when I was in the USA. Such is life! |
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During one of the, what is called the Nationale Sterrenkijkdagen in my country near the North Sea, a couple (husband and wife) were standing in one of the domes in our city's public observatory. The telescope was a Schmidt-Cassegrain, I think it was a Celestron C-10. The husband told his wife it (the Celestron C-10) was not something to scream through (she thought it was a megaphone). Somehow the eyepiece was missing. I should also tell you something about that night when, suddenly, two cops were standing in the public observatory's dome. Why were they not on the road? Someone of the visitors asked that question (whispering to me). I told him quietly that they were looking for a certain obscure person who was unofficially in the dome, operating the telescope without licence (that person was none other than... me). Somehow the cops were so impressed when they heard my astronomical babble that they forgot the main purpose of their... eh... nocturnal visit. Cops-n-the-dome. For your pleasure: Danny Caes, a dedicated and slightly naughty telescope operator between 1996 and 2006 in the public observatory known as "Armand Pien" (Ghent-Belgium). Oh yes... those were the nights... |
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-The nose. Which one of the two eyes is the most suitable one to look through the telescope? This question seems to be a frequent one among visitors of public observatories. My answer: Don't try to look with both eyes simultaneously because there's an obstruction in the middle of them: your nose. -The dog in the public observatory's dome. No, the visitors of public observatories are not always human beings, because I can tell you that during one certain evening one of the visitors was, in fact, a dog. I asked the visitors in the dome WHO IS THE OWNER OF THIS DOG? Nobody. How did that dog arrived in the public observatory's dome? (speaking of unanswered questions) (LOTS of them!). -The visitor who wanted to observe youfeaus. Yes... he (mister visitor of my city's public observatory) threw his own telescope into the canal because he wanted to observe youfeaus. You don't know what youfeaus are? (pardon me: UFO's). I told many visitors that if they were interested in youfeaus, they had to look for books which mentioned the rich history of ufology, such as those by Jacques Vallée or Donald Keyhoe, or Allen J. Hynek, or the Flemish ufologist Julien Weverbergh. The staff of the Public Observatory told the visitors: UFO'S ARE NONSENSE. BASTA! The visitors look'd at each other: What are we doing here? |
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| WHAT ?!?! AM I TOO LATE ?!?! A furious lady arrived at the dome of my city's public observatory, about an hour or so after a Total Lunar Eclipse. The telescope operator told the lady that the actual eclipse (the Full Moon looking as a dark and somewhat deep copper colored orb) was over (read: the bright "pseudo crescent phase" was already visible). My goodness, that night I was not at the Public Observatory, but someone of the observatory's staff told me afterward that this madam (the furious lady) somehow wanted to "turn back" the Total Lunar Eclipse. When the telescope operator told the lady about the impossibility to do such a thing (a natural phenomenon such as a Total Lunar Eclipse is quite a difficult happening to repeat during one single night), the lady went berserk, and told the telescope operator and the other visitors: YOU SHALL NEVER SEE ME HERE AGAIN !!! Eh... (...) well... yes... telescope operators are a bunch of amateurs. A frequently heard question ask'd by visitors in the domes of Public Observatories: Why does it look like a point of light? I thought it would look like the stars of the Stars-and-Stripes! A highly educated student was in the dome of the Public Observatory, and was looking through the restored ancient copper-gold colored Steinheil / T.Cooke-and-sons refractor, that evening aimed at the mysterious planet known as MARS. Somewhat puzzled he ask'd the question: Why can't we see one of the crawlers crawling its way between the boulders? Really, one should be a highly educated student, or even a professor, to ask this sort of intelligent questions. Is this the Little Bear? (Messier 45, the Pleiades). This must be the north polar star, right? (Alpha Canis Majoris, aka Sirius). The WHAT? The nocturnal Circumzenithal Arc from the Full Moon's light? What is that? What are you drinking? |
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About... When visitors of public observatories have more "focus" for the floor on which they are standing, in the dome. From 1996 to 2006 I was a dedicated telescope operator in my city's public observatory, and, believe it or not, the visitors wanted to know if I was a PROFESSOR (!). What could I do... I could have told them something like OH YES DEAR VISITORS, I AM THE SUMMUM OF MATHEMATICAL KNOWLEDGE, or... to tell the truth, I am an uneducated and unemployed amateur sky observer, and I want to learn you some unusual observing techniques which are nowhere mentioned or described. Well, when you say something like this the visitors have a sudden "focus" for the feet of other visitors and the floor on which all of them are standing. You don't exist anymore. But... when you tell them something which has the word MATHEMATICS in it, everyone is looking at you with eyes and mouths wide open... Much too often, sky watching is associated with mathematics. WHY ?!?! Does one always need mathematics to enjoy the mysterious shapes of gaseous nebulae and peculiar galaxies? D.C., as they say. |
