DAY FOUR: Tuesday, 3
June 2014
I went out to my chair and watched
the sun come up. I then walked one loop of the beach, and was finally
starting to feel tired. It was 6am when I laid down, and had a good 90
minute power-nap. Now that I was refreshed, I walked another loop, and
encountered a couple which had just arrived from Indiana, Dan and Katayla (who
said she was Russian, and had a bit of the accent). They walked with me for
a bit, as I informed these first-timers about some things to check out. I
learned about St. Croix pretty much by myself,
but I’ve enjoyed sharing what I’ve learned with others. It’s a way to
send some positive energy forward.
Since I had my VLBA appointment in
the early afternoon, I decided to spend most of the day on the beach. I grabbed a snorkel mask and swam around the beach in front of the
Palms. I was able to see some
Yellow-Tailed Snappers, and a few smaller fish I couldn’t identify.
Without my glasses everything was a little blurry, my mask kept fogging
up, and the design was making an annoying pressure right between my brows and
nose bridge. That made it hard enjoy it, so I returned the stuff to the
front desk.
I found a section of coral close to
the surface with a good drop-off close to the sandy shore I could stand on
(thus not standing on the coral). The wind was blowing and making some
white-caps roll in. They picked up force coming across the shallow part
where the coral was, and it was fun feeling the waves crash into me.
After a while I came into shore to talk to a local lady who’d brought her
one-year blue pit bull to the beach so she could treat with sores on the dog’s
coat with saltwater and a sand rub-down. The dog and owner were both very
friendly, but the dog (named Queen) got agitated when a couple guys brought a
horse down to the beach to teach it to swim. Since Queen was upset (not
violent, by the way), she couldn’t stay on the beach any longer.
I had a brief bite to eat before
getting cleaned up. The thought was to cruise the south side of the
island first, and perhaps get something to eat (before or after the 2 pm VLBA
tour) at either East End Pizza (at Divi Carina Bay Resort), or at the Buccaneer
(where Genieve worked). I also wanted to start looking for a
replacement luggage lock for the one TSA stole from me. I happened to
find a close approximation at the Home Depot, although the employee thought I’d
have much better luck at the K-Mart up the road. There weren’t any at the K-Mart, but I had
what I needed.
I drove south towards the former
Hess refinery, and then turned west towards Divi Carina (with signs pointing
the way). I passed the Boy Scout camp and the cattle farm, neither of
which had changed since the last I went through. I also stopped off at
Point Elizabeth in order to get a few shots of the south side of the island.
Some other pictures were taken at Cramer Park
Very Large Baseline Array (VLBA)
was housed in a small building, and operated by a two-person team. I met
with Greg Worrell (who I’d been talking with on the phone), and Bill LaGrange.
I talked a bit first about the mission of Austin Planetarium, showed some
pictures of our recent appearance at the Austin Mini-Maker Faire and May
edition of the Speaker Series. I also brought a few small promotional
items as token of my appreciation of being able to be here today.
The tour was conducted by Greg.
He showed me a short video about VLBA which had been produced by the
location in Sirocco, NM. (All the installations are designed exactly the
same so they can function as a unified whole.)
Greg is more of an engineer than an astronomer, which is more the skills
required here. The main job of the team us to keep the facility
operational, perform maintenance, and make adjustments where needed. Data
is collected and stored on hard drive banks with a capacity of 16 terabytes.
The data is then sent to and correlated with what was collected from the
other installations.
Thanks to advancements in
technology, the two rooms which used to house massive tape drives and
processors have been compacted into a more-efficient cabinet stack. Greg
still had some of the original equipment around so he could show them during tours,
like this tape reel.
VLBA deals with what can be
detected by radio waves, not by visible light, so their process is much
different than an observatory. And VLBA doesn’t listen to signals in
“real time” because those need to be processed and enhanced to filter out the
background noise and be audible. Greg noted the classic scene in Contact
where the pulses are detected and the images buried within the signal are
displayed were strictly a Hollywood creation.
Much of the explanation of the
whole process was very technical, and was in the realm of the Engineering
field. Larry would’ve been drooling if he was here. One of the
original pieces of equipment still in operation was the maser pulse generator.
Greg also showed me some images of other radio telescopes, and gave facts
about them. It was very informative, and I’m trying to do my best to
remember everything so I could relay that back to the rest of the crew at
Austin Planetarium.
When Greg handed me a hard hat to
wear, the most-exciting part of the tour began. We went outside to look
at the actual dish, which sets on four large wheels to allow it to rotate 360
degrees. The dish (currently sitting in the up, or “at rest,” position)
can be turned so the antenna is pointing parallel to the ground. While
the rotation is usually done from within the main building, there’s a set of
manual controls in a chamber at the base of the dish. The steps and
platforms are essentially metal grates so water doesn’t pool up on them, and
make them slippery.
As we ascended, I commented to Greg
that after my skydiving trip, my fear or falling was greatly reduced but not
completely gone. For me, going up things have always been easier, as I
don’t have to look at the ground. I was fine going up these steep-angled
steps, but I said I’ll see how well I do when it was time to come down.
When we crossed the catwalk over to chamber at the base I really enjoyed
the view, but could start to feel my heart rate increase a little, as I could
start to feel my heart rate increase a little as I could now see how high up I
was fine again.
The chamber is sealed (as much as
possible) to keep the equipment cool and at a constant temperature. Greg
pointed out the multiple collectors that were there, each designed to scan
within a certain bandwidth. Just being able to go up the structure was
awesome, and then Greg was about to make it even more exhilarating.
He opened an outer hatch, and we
proceeded to walk out into the actual bowl of the dish. The surface was a
little chalky, but not slick, so it was easy to stand. At Greg’s urging,
I scaled up the side and was able to peer over the edge at Buck Island St. Thomas and St. John
(at a fuzzy distance), but the haze in the air (from the Sahara
sand in the atmosphere) limited the visibility.
Greg took a number of pictures of
me here in order for me to be able to prove (and create envy) to my friends
that I was here. Words cannot express how this became the high-point of
the trip (no pun intended).
We ventured back inside the base
chamber, and then began the descent back down. Having to look down to
make sure I was placing my foot on a step made my heart rate, and about
half-way down my knees began to shake. After that, the intensity
plateaued because I’d passed the point which made me anxious.
Back on the ground, Greg gave the
array a few commands so I could watch it rotate around. The dish was
moved as far “down” as it could go (which brought it to a position parallel
with the ground).
From start to finish, this was a
three-hour tour, and was much more involved and hands-on than I ever imagined
it could be. It was now the end of Greg’s day, and we chatted a short
time before we departed the site. He mentioned there was an Astronomy
group on the island, so that’s something for me to research further.
Heading back westward, I was able
to take Route 66 (also known as the Christiansted Bypass) to avoid the annoying
traffic pattern there. I saw there was a scenic look-out which I’d have
to come back to when the sky was clearer. Back at the Palms I headed to
the bar so I could tell Matt of the interesting adventure I had today, but his
shift had already ended. I sat at the bar and got some journaling done,
and tried a new root beer from St.
John’s Brewery which I thought was very good.
I debated getting dinner because I
was starved (since I hadn’t eaten since about noon when I left the Palms).
Instead of the more formal sit-down fare, I opted for a cheese pizza.
The bready nature would be helpful when it was time to start drinking
again. I expected a small size, and this was equal to a medium pie I’d
get back state-side. I only ate half of
it, and then brought the rest back to my room fridge. I returned to the
bar to hang out, but there weren’t too many people present.
A little later Michelle came in.
She’d been having dinner with her work contact who was here, as she
needed to make arrangements to get to UVI for her gig tomorrow. We got drinks, and then headed back to the
patio to chill a bit. It was nice to sit and soak up the atmosphere, and
hear the crash of the waves. The night ended early because she had to be
at UVI by 8 the next morning. I returned to my chair and soaked up the
atmosphere some more. Spending this week with someone to share would be
better, but it was the tranquil experience is why I came to the island. I
killed another third of the complimentary Cruzan bottle to help me end the
night.
For more information on the places visited or mentioned:
Very Long Baseline Array: http://www.vlba.nrao.edu/sites/stcroix.shtml
Austin Planetarium (Facebook
page): https://www.facebook.com/pages/Austin-Planetarium/280388248684669
St. Croix Astronomy Group: http://stcroixsource.com/content/community/miscellaneous/2011/12/13/astronomy-club-seeks-stargazers
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Hi Dave! How does one get in on that awesome looking VLBA tour? We will be in St Croix from Oct 21 through the 25th, and I haven't been able to find anything on the interwebs to say how to do what you did.
ReplyDeleteBrian Pace - bpace@erols.com, 703-732-1000
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