SolarChat!

Sad to announce the passing of forum member Bill Hrudey from the Caymen Islands. Bill was known on the forum for his hi-res images with his 8" solar newton, and was a contributor in the mods section with the superb 12" solar newton he was constructing viewtopic.php?f=9&t=20050 , I always admired Bills engineering, tooling and problem solving skills. Sadly Bill announced in December that he was diagnosed with esophageal adenocarcinoma with survival time in single digit months. I was contacted by an associate from Bills at the University to tell me of Bills passing on 22nd February. I attach the following message:

Hello, the solar imager Dr. William Hrudey died on February 22, 2018. I am contacting you in the hope that you are familar with his work and can help me find someone to carry on his work at UCCI. Dr. Hrudey's observatory and laboratory has many telescopes, imagers and computer support equipment, and I think it is important to preserve this equatorial lab and continue its use into the future. Therefore, I need to find a student, ideally a young Ph.D. who can live and work in Grand Cayman and develop this lab, either as a temporary fellow or on a more permanent basis. I am hoping you can refer me to others in the solar imaging community who can help me identify potential candidates for this role.

If you know of anyone who may be suitable or interested please contact me directly and I will forward details, it would be nice to see Bills solar legacy carried on.

Thoughts with Gigi, his partner.

Mark

Thanks for sharing this, Mark.

Thank you Mark for the notification. I always enjoyed his excellent solar work and his graceful online presence.

Franco

Mark:
Really sad, we will miss Bill.
Best regards and condolences to his family.
Eric.

This comes as a shock. We had some some exciting discussions on solar imaging and processing, as well as on solar telescopes.
Condelences to his family.

A very sad news.

My sincere condolences to Bill's family.

RIP

He will be sadly missed by many. My thought go out to the family. RIP.

I think we will all miss Bill's excellence at solar imaging. A very sad loss to our community.

My condolences to his family, friends and associates.

Stu.

Very sad. A profound loss to this community. My sympathies to his family.

Bill’s thread on his solar Newtonian is magnificent. I sincerely hope they’re able to find someone to carry on his legacy.

That is such sad news, I will really miss Bill's white light close ups I send my best wishes to his family and friends and hope his work carries on.

Sometimes I wonder what happens to folks who disappear from the forum, I always hope they are OK but I do sometimes fear the worst. It is nice that they contacted you Mark.

Alexandra

This is a lovely article
https://www.caymancompass.com/2018/02/2 ... ies-at-76/

Thanks for posting the article about Bill, Alexandra. An inspiring man
Robert

Thanks for the update Mark....sad news indeed and my thoughts are with his family as well.

Hopefully they will find someone to carry on Bill's work.

Brian

sad news indeed, condolences to Bill's family

That is a lovely article Alexandra

Thanks Mark I will miss Bills posts and hopefully his notes here will be of value for future Solar observers.My deepest sympathies to his family I know how difficult it can be to get back on track after losing someone.
Derek

RIP

Thanks Mark for informing us about Bill's passing. Thanks Alexandra for that article on Bill.

Bill has been an inspiration for me, especially on imaging granulations on the Sun. I went back to look at his postings and also his responses to me.

I will miss his presence in the forum and his gentle and useful comments to my postings.

I will try to find out how to send my condolences to his family.

Alfred

That’s a great article thanks for the link Alexandra.