Mt. Graham and the LBT from Kitt Peak

Tucson is known as the Astronomy Capital of the World because it has attracted so many observatories to its dry climate with more than 200 clear nights a year.  I happen to observe mostly on Kitt Peak, though I have also spent nights at nearly all the major observatories, including Mt. Bigelow in the Catalinas just north of town, Mt. Hopkins south of town, and Mt. Graham east of Tucson near Safford.  Mt. Graham houses the largest telescope in Arizona in the Large Binocular Telescope which combines the light of two 8-meter mirrors.  The LBT as it is called is huge and its building dwarfs most other buildings.  I have posted pictures on this blog in years past of the LBT as it is seen from the VATT (Vatican Advanced Technology Telescope) that is a short hike away from the LBT on Mt. Graham and is a great place to take pictures of the giant LBT.  It so happens that you can see the LBT from Kitt Peak which is a mere 112 miles away.  You can see it pretty easily when it is backlit in the morning sunrise with a pair of binoculars.

 This first image was taken this morning just after sunrise with my 75-300mm telephoto at 300mm with an exposure of 1/350 seconds at f/8, ISO 800.  You can see the LBT building on the distant Mt. Graham a bit left of center.  The mountains in front of Mt. Graham are the eastern end of the Santa Catalina's and in the middle foreground are the Tucson Mountains with the most prominent at the right edge being Cat Mountain.

In the mid-day sun, you can see lots of mountains, but you won't see the LBT very easily.  In the foreground are the Coyote Mountains that are part of the Quinlan mountain range that Kitt Peak is part of.  In the distance is Tucson surrounded by the Tucson Mountains to the west, the Santa Catalinas to the north and the Rincons to the East (at the right edge of the frame).  In the saddle between the Catalinas and Rincons you can see the distant Pineleno mountains that Mt. Graham is the tallest point of and is where the LBT is located.  This image was taken with my 75-300mm telephoto at 75mm focal length with an exposure of 1/3000 sec at f/16, ISO 800.

Taken around the same time, here is the view of Mt. Graham with my 75-300mm telephoto at 300mm focal length with an exposure of 1/2000 sec at f/11, ISO 400.

This last image was taken just before sunset with the shadow of Kitt Peak just below the frame.  What is cool is that the LBT is a bright white object that was plainly visible with my unaided eye and is an easy thing to see in this image.  Compare this to the earlier ones to see where the LBT is in those images.  Today was the 2nd time that I've seen the LBT without any visual aid from Kitt Peak and it requires the sun to be just in the right place and I presume the LBT dome has to be rotated so that it reflects light right back to us.  This image was taken at 300mm with an exposure of 1/1000 seconds at f/11, ISO 400.

The LBT on Mount Graham

Last observing run, I took this image of the LBT (Large Binocular Telescope) on Mt. Graham from Kitt Peak. Look carefully near the center of the image and you'll see a square bump which is the humongous building (seen in images I took back in April of this year or September of last year from the VATT, as well as some fine images of it by my friend Dave on his blog). The building is about 113 miles away! You can see almost forever from Kitt Peak. Or at least all the way to Mt. Graham. This image was taken at 300mm focal length with an exposure of 1/200 seconds at f/5.6, ISO 400.

Snow covered sunrise

There was no observing this night - last Wednesday night. As the morning twilight brightens the eastern sky, snow still covers the top of Mt. Graham with the SMT and LBT visible in this image. The image was taken with my 24mm lens with an exposure of 3.2 seconds at f/4.0, ISO 400.

Mt. Graham at work

Here's a view from Saturday night with both the SMT in the foreground and the LBT in the background at work on a moonlit spring night. The constellation of Bootes lies on its side as it rises behind the two telescopes. The LBT doesn't look as big as it is from this vantage point - but when one stands beside the behemouth, or looks at the telescope itself from inside the building, one gets the right impression of just how big this telescope really is with 2 - 8 meter diameter mirrors working in tandem. The Gregorian secondaries are about the size of the telescopes I am used to using! This image was taken at 18mm focal length with an exposure of 60 seconds at f/3.5, ISO 400.

Night-time on Mt. Graham

The SMT is busy while the LBT remains closed (though it and its dome moved during my timelapse sequence that this frame is taken from) as the Moon lights up the scene on Mt. Graham looking east from the VATT. This image was taken at 18mm focal length with an exposure of 1 minute at f/3.5, ISO 400.

Snowy sunset

The sun came out late in the day as the storm that brought us so much snow moved out. Though it stayed cloudy most of the night, it was clear by the next morning. This image was taken at 24mm focal length with an exposure of 1/320 seconds at f/8, ISO 100.

Winter on Mt. Graham

A bit of a surprise at how much snow fell up here on Mount Graham yesterday. I was expecting at best fluries or maybe an inch, but it was snowy and cold most of the day with about 4-6 inches accumulated. This image shows the SMT in the foreground with the LBT appearing to come out of the misty clouds. The image was taken with my 24mm lens at f/8 with an exposure of 1/250 seconds, ISO 100.

SMT on Mt. Graham

The Submillimeter Telescope on Mt. Graham is one of our next door neighbors not far from the VATT. This is a view into the telescope building to the telescope itself. This image was taken at 18mm focal length with an exposure of 1/250 seconds at f/10, ISO 100.

On a clear day, you can see forever....

...or at least to Mount Graham. The dust from high winds early in the week have gone away and yesterday, I could see very distant mountains from Kitt Peak including Mount Graham where I'll be observing next month again at the VATT. Mount Graham must be at least 100 miles away from Kitt Peak. This view shows the mountains in the foreground very near Kitt Peak. Just left of the top of those foreground mountains is Ryan Field airport along Ajo road. Directly above Ryan Field is Cat Mountain with Tucson behind it. The southeastern end of the Santa Catalina mountains is next and on the horizon above that is Mount Graham. I believe the Galliuros Mountains are visible between Mt. Graham and the Catalinas. This view was taken at 300mm focal length with an exposure of 1/300 seconds at f/8, ISO 100.

I'm Free!

This mouse was happy to get out of the trap (lucky for him, it was a live trap, seen at right), but probably not so happy that he was no longer inside the warm VATT building. This guy was one of about 37 mice that were caught in about 9 days. This image was taken at 49mm focal length with an exposure of 1/60 seconds at f/5.6, ISO 800, with on camera flash.

Towards Tucson

This is the view towards Tucson from the top of the VATT building on Mount Graham. The setting sun lights up the right side of the frame and the VATT dome is on the left. On the horizon just right of the VATT dome are the Rincon Mountains. Just right of the tall pine tree near center are the Santa Catalinas. In the middle, foreground, just left of the tall pine are the Gallieros, I believe. In the distance between the Rincons and Catalinas over redington Pass is Kitt Peak. This image was taken at 18mm focal length with an exposure of 1/400 seconds at f/13, ISO 400.

VATT control room

My friend Dave looks over one of the consoles in the VATT control room. The room is on the 2nd floor above the main living area and adjacent to some work areas. Every area of the building had some sort of equipment related to running the telescope, whether it was computers that run the drive motors or compressors feeding air into the many systems. The VATT control room is one of the more comfortable control rooms I've seen at a telescope. Our control rooms at both Spacewatch telescopes, for example, do not have any carpeting (we are concerned about the static discharges that may come from that as much of our equipment that runs the telescope is in or adjacent to the control rooms, for example). This image was taken with an 8mm fisheye lens with an exposure of 1/13 seconds at f/3.5, ISO 800.

LBT support structure

I had been thinking I'd posted all my favorite pictures from my Mt. Graham observing run, but I went back through them tonight and found one or two of the LBT telescope itself. This is the back of the telescope support structure of the LBT. The round red structure on the left is the mirror cell for one of the two 8.4-meter diameter mirrors and is about 30 feet across! The inside of the dome is probably 60 feet tall and about 80 or 100 feet wide (maybe more!). What a gargantuan structure it is. And it all moves with the precision of a watch. This image was taken with an 8mm fisheye lens with an exposure of 1/30 seconds at f/3.5, ISO 800.

LBT and SMT in twilight

As twilight fades, two of the 3 telescopes on Mount Graham are seen in this photo. The LBT is in the background. The SMT is in the building in the foreground. This image was taken at 18mm focal length with an exposure of 1/10 seconds at f/5.0, ISO 800.

LBT in twilight

The LBT in twilight. You can see the two 8.4 meter diameter mirrors carried in a red alt-azimuth mount. The top part of this humungous building rotates with the telescope. This image was taken at 55mm focal length with an exposure of 1/13 seconds at f/5.6, ISO 800.

B&W LBT in twiight

The LBT is lit up in twilight in this B&W conversion. This image was taken at 55mm focal length with an exposure of 1/10 second at f/5.6, ISO 800.

Anticrepuscular rays & the LBT

Anticrepuscular rays are visible in the skies over Mount Graham in this image. The rays almost converge on the LBT. The SMT is left of the LBT and the VATT dome is visible on the right edge with the quarter phase moon just to its left. This image was taken with an 8mm fisheye lens with an exposure of 1/40 seconds at f/3.5, ISO 400.

VATT at work

This shot of the VATT at work in moonlight was almost a great shot. When I first brought it up on my computer, I instantly exclaimed "D'Oh!" - The handle of my tripod is jutting out into the field of this fisheye view! The dark cylindrical object at lower left is the silhouette of the handle. I often mount my camera on the tripod with the vertical tilt handle in front of the camera so I can tilt the camera and tripod up to vertical for astrophotography. That's normally not a problem, unless you use an 8mm fisheye as I did here..... This image used an exposure of 120 seconds at f/3.5, ISO 400.

SMT & LBT

Another view from Thursday night shows the SMT building in the foreground with the red light at its base and the LBT in the background. An airplane is also visible just above the SMT building. The Moonlit scene also shows the Milky Way overhead. This image was taken with an 8mm fisheye lens with an exposure of 120 seconds at f/3.5, ISO 400.

Fisheye VATT

This fisheye view of the VATT building also shows the glow of the Moon behind the dome at left as well as the Milky Way and the forest. The building is lit by some red lights on the SMT entrance but doesn't affect the observing inside the building. This image was taken with an 8mm fisheye lens with an exposure of 120 seconds at f/3.5, ISO 400.