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Transit of Venus June 8, 2004
Final Report
Reported By: Mohammad Akoochekian
Venus Transit
2004 Photos
HRC
Program For Transit
Numerical Results
Simulation Match 2004
Finally after two
years research, studying and programming Venus planet became close
to its transit time. Since 2002 till now HRC astronomy department
had programs for transit to do all things correct and get useful
results. Many information and data had been obtained form internet
and books. Also, K1 observatory equipped to modern tools for live
webcasting and digital photographing. Our live broadcasting was
introduced By:
In scientific part,
astronomy department established a team consist of university and
high school students for international common projects with Essen
university (Germany), Nehru planetarium (India) .
Space India organizatin, a group in Mauritius and a
group in Spain. These projects were:
Following HRC members were
participants of these international projects:
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Marzieh Pooramrolahi
(Team Manager) |
Nasim Khosravi
Project 1,5 |
Akram Mir Ahmady
Project 2 |
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Mina Soltan
Gheis
Projetc 3 |
Zahra Eizady
Project 4 |
Mansooreh Pezeshkzad
Project 5 |
Scientific and
technical teams had more than 20 observation camping in K1
observatory. They tested their equipments and increased their
own experiences, because they know this golden opportunity will not
repeated till 8 years later and at that date Iran hasn't suitable
position for transit observation.
Now, After two years
we were coming toward K1 observatory for Venus transit. After 122
years we were repeating what past scientists had been done to record
transit data but this time by modern tools. We started our movement on June 07, 2004 at 19:30. The
members of HRC team:
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Moammad Akoochekian
(HRC President)
Dr Mohammad Rafieinia
Astro Dept Manager |
Scientific Team |
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Ehsan Eslahi
HRC Public
Comunication |
Zoya
Shokoohi
Telescope Controller |
And Davood
Pooladsaz in HRC controlled all technical things of live
webcasting. Finally HRC team arrived
to observatory at 20:15. They carried their equipments to the K1
observatory.
After one hour they
install all equipments and started to align telescope, CCD and
testing internet connections for live webcasting.
Marzieh Pooramrollhi, Zoya Shokoohi and Mohammad Akoochekian had
these responsibilities.
After dinner that was
a good time for rest and talk, the team started to work again. This
stage was started with debating on form of projects doing.
Akoochekian, Rafieinia and scientific team established some programs
in different times for members. Then in the midnight some of them
went to observation by telescope.
On 3:00 O'clock we
finished our programs and went to sleep. In the morning of June 8 we
waked up with sunrise. Chees, bread, tomato and ... were available
for breakfast. A breakfast in happy space.
After breakfast again we started to work. The time of transit was close and There is no
enough time for other activities. Some problems occurred in
telephone line of observatory. So we must went to the factory
manager's office, because he could help us to solve these problems
soon.
Mr Niknam helped us very well and the problems were solved
sooner than we thought.
At this time other
members in K1 turned on the telescope and were aligning it.
Photographers were testing their tools to record transit with best
quality.
The time of transit
become closer and closer. All were await, wait to watch what no live
human
till now could observe. Wait to see result of their two-years
attempts.
Now scientific team
started their project to measure shadow lengths and times, to
calculate culmination time and earth radius.
At 9:20 we started to
live webcasting by sending an image from solar disk with this message
"Hi Every Body, We Come" . I understood
that about 20000 visitors are in HRCglobal.net. This was very good
but if this number passed from 50000, many of visitors could not come
into the HRC www to watch live transit. This problem happened about
9:40and number of visitors passed from 80000. My friend Ali Rahimi
and me tried to solve this problem. But huge
number of visitors caused other problems against our attempts.
Finally on 9:49 Venus
slowly came over the solar disk. Marzieh Pooramrollahi, Dr Rafieinia
and Zoya Shokoohi were searching to finde shadow of Venus on solar
limb. Suddenly, they found it, the image was shown on monitor
display. They fixed telescope on Venus and image recording started
by analogue
video and digital computer. All members looked at monitor display
carefully. At this time Mr. Niknam (Shirin Nam factory manager) and
his friend came into the observatory to watch transit.
Now other projects
(photography, timing, data recording, ...) were started. We sent our
image to the internet for all, around the world.
All members worked
hardly to record data and photos from transit. Among the transit
some engineers and technicians of factory came into the observatory
to observe transit as live. The enjoyed when saw the Venus shadow on
solar disk easily. We took many movies and photos till noon that we
stopped work for lunch. For lunch HRC provided tuna fish and drink.
All members in a friendly environment ate their lunch.
After lunch, members
who their measurements had been finished, analyzed their own data. They
obtained culmination time, the smallest shadow lenght, solar height of
culmination, times of project 4, ... . They calculated what they
want, very carefully. Other members went for their responsibility or
rest. Some of them didn't sleep from last night so were very tired
and need to little sleep.
At rest time high
school students opened their school books and continued with
studying, because the transit was placed among Iran schools and
university examinations. After a little rest all, returned to their
responsibility. We were very tired but some happy faces gave us
great power to continue. These faces told us "cheer up", "power to
you" .
Finally at about 15:30
the 3rd contact occurred. We record movie since first times till end
of 4th contact. At this time engineers of factory came into the K1
to see last times of transit. When transit finished the happy voices
and shouting of members filled the observatory. this was one the
beautiful voice in my life. They congratulated together for this
great success. We got all we wanted.
Now we must be await
for other countries data to calculate the Sun-Venus parallax. At the
end of this great sky party, members took some memorial photos
together.
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Shirin Nam
CHIDAK Gaz |
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