The Rhyme of the L3 Satellite (II)

They should have sent a poet... but they didn't. Only me. Sorry.


The Sun now rose upon the right:
Out of the sea came he,
He raised Tsys, and through the mist,
Went down behind the sea.

Or to put it another way, the Sun makes data bad. What a surprise.

And the other cats still came along,
But no sweet Leo did follow,
Nor any day for food or play
Came to the astronomer's gazebo !

And that was indeed a hellish thing,
And it all of them laid low:
For all averred, the sciency nerds,
Leo had set them all aglow.
To the vets ! said they, take the cats today !
Or more will surely follow.

Nor dim nor red, like God's own head,
The glorious sun uprist:
Then all averred, those sciency nerds,
That it greatly raised Tsys.
'Twas right, said they, the vet to pay,
Though Leo we all miss.

The sky so seen, in radio beam,
A unique facility !
We were the first that ever burst
That particular frequency.

Down came the data, it was sent down,
'Twas as useful as could be;
The Astronomer could not take lunch-break:
So reduced data quietly !

I couldn't possibly comment.

All tropical heat and azure sky,
The blazing Sun, at noon,
Right up above the platform did stand,
No bigger than the Moon.

Which is a unique cosmic coincidence.

Day after day, day after night,
The data reduced only in slow-motion,
With GRIDZILLA slower than any cargo ship
Adrift upon the ocean.

GRIDZILLA is the software of choice for processing HI data. But it is indeed slower than a tranquillised tortoise with three broken legs because it isn't parallelised.

Data, data, every where,
And certain scientists think -
Data, data every where,
And lots of Scotch to drink !

I couldn't possibly comment.

The wealth of data did indicate,
That there should be much to do.
And furry cats did crawl with legs
The mother and kittens two.

About, about, in reel and rout
ALFA spun by day and night;
The WAPPs, restarting as though cursed,
Gave us all a fright !

ALFA is the receiver what detects hydrogen and stuff. WAPPs are processing instruments for which we can't get any more replacement parts.

And some in dreams assured were
Of the villain that plagued us so;
Bringing students unbidden he followed us
All across Puerto Rico !

I couldn't possibly comment.

And every tongue, through utter drought,
Was withered at the root;
We could not speak, no more than if
We had been choked with soot.

There didn't seem to be any need to change that last verse from the Coleridge original, so I didn't.

And O ! the fearful looks
He wrought in old and young !
Instead of data, a student's unwrit paper
About my neck was hung.

DISCLAIMER : Unless I'm suddenly given a student who can't spell their own name, supervising them won't be all that bad. This is an exaggeration, for the lols and whatnot.

The Rhyme of the L3 Satellite

Unfortunately I've been writing "poetry" in the AGES observing log again. And that means blog readers will have to suffer my verbal effluence as I ramble incoherently about the problems of satellite-induced RFI and the merits of cats in Coleridge-esque manner.

Pretty pictures will follow shortly to placate those not enamoured of Coleridge spoofs.

The Rhyme of The L3 Satellite

How an Astronomer suffered from interference from a Satellite transmitting in the L3 frequency band, and how the Observatory came to be full of Cats, and the many strange things that befell, and by what means the Astronomer learned to cope with the interference.

Part I

It is an orbiting satellite,
And it transmiteth at L3,
'By thou cursed and wretched RFI,
Wherefore must you lower sensitivity ? 


ALFA's cover is opened wide,
And I am happily observing,
I baked these brownies specially,
A feast of which I am deserving.'

I've developed a tendency to bake things. Amongst other things it makes the observing runs a lot more pleasant.


It holds him with its transmitting strength,
"There was a ship," quoth he,
"Hold off ! Unhand me, satellite, SOON !"
Eftsoons his strength dropped he.


It holds him with its RFI,
The astronomer sat still,
And listens like a three-years' child,
The satellite hath its will.



The Astronomer sat on a chair,
He cannot but choose to fear,
The ruin of his collected data,
From the satellite so near.


'The rocket was cheered, the launch-pad cleared,
Merrily did it aloft,
Above the sky, above the clouds,
Above the control-room top.


(A source rose up upon the left,
O'er the dish came he!
And he shone bright, then on the right
Set below the Observatory.)


Higher and higher every minute,
Toward orbit the rocket went around - "
The Astronomer here had a pang of fear,
For he heard a gong-like sound.

CIMA, the software which controls the telescope, is want to produce many a strange sound when anything happens. A gong indicates something has just finished.


CIMA hath found some errors,
Red on the screen were thee,
Shaking his head with much regret,
The Astronomer preferred to flee.


The Astronomer sat on a chair,
He cannot but choose to fear,
The ruin of his collected data,
From the satellite so near.


But now a new source arose, and it,
Was tyrannous and strong:
It caused unpleasant Gibbs ringing,
But lasted not for long.

Gibbs ringing is caused by very bright sources - basically it just means that the data gets slightly noisier than it should be.


With heavy heart and furrowed brow,
As those struck with RFI must know,
To fear the signal from their foe,
And forward hangs his head,
The Astronomer stuck fast, ignored the blast,
Of the satellite overhead.

[CHRISTMAS INTERMISSION : ROBERT MINCHIN TAKES OVER]

Rhys is away
No poetry today
Problems with the ALFA rotator
Solved before they affected the data


I must turn on the ALFA again
To observe the slowly-drifting sky
And all I ask is a big dish
And a star to steer it by

[...AND WE'RE BACK !]

And in Cardiff it grew wondrous cold,

There came both ice and snow,

The Astronomer sighed, and wondered why,

He was in sunny Puerto Rico.

And through the trees a warming breeze,

Did gift a sweaty sheen,

Nor sign of detection to be ken,

The RFI was all between.

The satellite was still here, up over by there,

Its RFI was all around:

It flushed and caw'd, and gong'd and roared,

In CIMA's many sounds !

There is a running joke about how to navigate in Wales.

At length there sat a kitty-cat,

Down from a hill she came,

As since she was so very thin,

We fed her to make her tame.

She ate the food she ne'er had ate,
And fatter and fatter she grew,
Until one day she stole away,
To produce kittens all anew !

And a good routine was started then,

The kittens they did follow,

And every day, for food and play,

Came to the astronomer's gazebo !

In mist and cloud, when rain allowed,
They for chicken skin did whine;
Whilst all the night, through fog-smoke white,
They slept soundly all the time.

"I despise thee, orbiting satellite,

Your RFI requires I distract,

From this feline-engrossed state ." - "But outside the gate" 

"Someone smote that kitty-cat."

Alas, one of the three kittens had an unfortunate accident with a car - no, NOT my car, actually, I was away at the time. But two remain.

You'll be glad to know that there isn't any more AGES observing scheduled for a while, and in any case the Rime of the Ancient Mariner is quite long, so it will be a long time before part 2 is ready.

Madness, Science, and Opium

Recently I made a concerted effort to describe the schizophrenic nature of professional science. Readers will also have noted my heartfelt contempt for the unavoidable chore of writing papers. a process just as much of a double-edged sword as the analysis itself. While original thought is not only encouraged by a basic requirement to publish, original style is often looked on as heretical. 

There is, alas, a very good reason for this - anything that can be misinterpreted could ruin other people's research if they try and replicate the results. Which leads to virtually every paper feeling as though they've been written by the same very dull person. The kind who can't watch golf because it's too exciting and brings them out in a rash.

You might therefore expect that actually collecting the data in the first place allows for the same creative potential, as, say, watching a brick. Not watching it do anything, you understand, just generally watching it in case it misbehaves. In keeping with the theme of schizophrenia, you're only half right. Or only half of you is right. Or are right. Whatever.

What the observing process offers that the other aspects of astronomy don't is free time. Last time I mentioned that most of this is spent reading the BBC website, which is true, but it is not the whole story. One thing I do is to decorate my notebook, using a biro.

An earlier creative outlet, started by another observer, is to write poetry in the observing logs. Mostly these are in haiku form. Possibly this is because Wim van Driel really likes haikus, or maybe just because they don't take too much time and effort to write. The following are the haikus of other observers (namely Steve Schneider and Win van Driel) from the past 6 years of observations :

ALFA rotating

Universe slowly drifting

HI line searching

Warm winter moonrise 

Coquis outside harmonise 

Trained monkeys observe 

Seek on this island 

Koan you can understand 

Then clap with one hand 

End-of-year party 

Hot salsa cool Bacardi 

B4 mystery 

Night watches over 

Let others gas discover 

Sleep to recover 

spring stars flickering

atoms coolly emitting:

distant observing

Wim's busy tonight

no time for any haikus

that makes me so sad

starry night tonight

no time for radio waves

must install software

Ginger beer drinking

Alarms constantly sounding

Chips misbehaving

cajun spice smelling

into Orchid dscending

Lost season ending

Zen rock gardening

Manassas Stonewall standing

AGES observing

My own efforts are generally less poetic, with more of an attempt to use them as an actual observing log :

Observing quite smooth 

Not much RFI tonight 

All beams are working.

Observations fine

Not many warnings at all

Tea keeps me awake.

Not enough haikus

I shall rectify this now

With bad poetry

Beam 6B is down

Why so few haikus lately ?

We need Wim back now.

Just two scans taken, 

ALFA rotation problems, 

But all beams work now ! 

All scans completed, 

All beams are still working well, 

This haiku is done.

Being a fan of Edward Lear, like all good-hearted people, I attempted a single limerick :

It's a survey for deep HI data, 

From a telescope shaped like a crater, 

It really takes AGES, 

So it's done in small stages, 

And has a fixed-temperature calibrator.

Lately I decided that haikus lack a certain something, so I decided to go for broke and try to parody one of my favourite poems of all time : Kubla Khan by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. It probably helps to go and read the original first, if you haven't already. Coleridge was taking opium at the time, but all I had for inspiration was massive sleep deprivation.

In Arecibo did Kubla Khan, 
A stately observing-run decree, 
Where Tanama, the muddy river, ran, 
Through caverns measurable to man, 
Down to a sun-drenched sea. 

The Tanama is the local river, which flows through some nearby spectacular caves and also goes underneath the Observatory grounds.

So about a mile of telescope ground, 
With fence and towers girdled round, 
And there were gardens bright on sinuous rills, 
Where blossomed many a UMET-imported shrubbery, 
And here were forests ancient as the hills, 
Enfolding rainy spots of greenery.

UMET is the institution responsible for site maintenance. Which includes planting a lot of flowers.

But oh ! that very steep road which slanted,
Down the green hill toward a metal cover !
An underfunded place ! as holy as enchanted
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By a tiedown wailing from its demon-motor !

Tiedowns are cables which control the height of the platform. One of the motors is failing, which really does sound like the cry of a banshee, conveniently.

And beneath the dish, from unpaid overtime seething,
The drainage pumps no more were heaving,
A quite small lake momently was forced:
Amid whose swift rain-fed burst
Confusion spread like rebounding hail
Or scientists beneath [CENSORED]'s flail :

On several occasions over the years, for various reasons, a small lake has formed underneath the dish (in this case a reference to not being able to pay the necessary people to come and man the pumps, a particularly daft problem which was quickly remedied). [CENSORED] refers to an individual on whom I cannot possibly comment, for now.

And 'mid these dancing scientists at once and ever
Up flung momently the muddy river,
Several miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and field the muddy river ran
Then reached the caverns measurable to man
And sank in silence to a tropical ocean.
And 'mid this silence so many from far
Sent a twitter message to a nameless star !

Which of course refers back to last year's music video and the current efforts to send twitter messages to aliens.

The shadow of the dome of Gregor
Suspended with metallic grace
Within was heard with mingled measure
A signal from the voids of space !
It was a miracle of rare device
A dome in air, and beans and rice !

The Gregorian dome - named after a mathematician called Gregory but Gregor will do - is where all the really cool instruments live. For the unaware, "beans and rice" is NOT an act of desperation to find something that rhymes - it refers to what is basically the Puerto Rican national dish.

A damsel wearing headphones
In a movie I once saw
She was an American maid
And with some telescopes she played
But what could be the headphones for ?

Of course, this is Contact, because one should never miss out an opportunity to make fun of Jodie Foster for using headphones at a telescope.

Could I contrive within me
To write dialogue and song
For an alt'rnate version of the movie
It would have music loud and wrong, [DAMN YOU KESHA !]
I will use that dome in air
That sunny dome ! The endless rice !

Since Coleridge's "caves of ice" just don't work here, I again refer back to the ubiquitous rice, and the music video.

And all who can should see them there,
A platform tour of ALFA's lair !
With flashing lights all twinkling there !

Clear a circle round him quickly,
And hold your nose with utmost dread,
For he on rice and beans fed strictly,
He rather'd something else instead.

Anyone suffering from questionable poetic tastes may continue to read this doggerel here. Most log entries aren't very interesting though, because not everyone who writes the entry (the "observer" column is the telescope operator, not whoever wrote the log) troubles themselves to assess the literary impact of their record of the night's events.