On the evening of March 12, 2009, the Sedgwick telescope, looking outside from the doorway of the LCOGT warehouse, was put on sky for the first time. As it was primarily a test for the drive system's tracking performance, the goal for the night was to point at a star and observe how long the scope could follow it in the sky. After finding the star "Dubhe" in the eyepiece, it was determined that the telescope was tracking adequately after the star remained in the field of view (only starting to drift out after an hour or so). This was impressive, considering the only alignment it had was based on a precision painted line of spray-paint on the warehouse floor. A bottle of bubbly was popped opened to celebrate.
While this is an important milestone, there are a few other items that need to be done before the telescope is ready to be installed at the Sedgwick site. The primary and secondary mirror have not been collimated yet, and the first images reflected this all too well. The drive software needs minor tweaking, and the only way to verify it will all function reliably is by looking at stars again.
Weather permitting, the telescope will be driven on an air-ride truck to the Sedgwick site sometime in the middle of the week of March 30th. The Ash dome is essentially ready for a telescope. Stay tuned for future updates!