Because the LDT is a complex modern facility, startup at the beginning of the night can take a while. The purpose of this page is to provide a guide for the observer about what steps occur at the start of the night, and at what point different observer tasks may be done.
hfkjlhlkjhkjlchxlkj
- LDT start up:
- TO responsibilities
- The TO(s) will start up the facility starting 1 to 1.5 hours before sunset. The standard intent is to be ready to operate a little before sunset. If your observing program needs to ready earlier, please communicate this to the TO and arrange a revised schedule.
- Start up includes verifying that all LDT systems are in proper working order and then starting up the telescope, active optics, dome, and environmental monitoring systems. During the start up process, the TO may not be immediately available as they have to walk through the site to do the check out.
- Observer responsibilities
- Observers are generally responsible for starting up the instrument(s) they expect to use during the night. The observer should communicate with the TO about when they can start up the instrument.
- Once the TO confirms that the facility is operational, the observers can begin taking calibrations. If you need to start calibrations early, please arrange a time with the TO. Some instruments can do calibrations entirely internally (i.e. they do not need to interact with the telescope or facility). In those cases, the observer can start earlier, but should still advise the TO about their plans.
- Calibrations
- Internal calibrations: E.g. biases for CCDs can be done just about anytime. NIHTS biases and darks during the afternoon. EXPRES BON calibrations are done internal to EXPRES.
- Flats - either dome flats or sky flats.
- Observing
- Astronomer’s Guide to LDT Startup Procedures / What the TO does at night [How is this helping my data?] Guiding breakpoint? Start frame, then do guiding? Guiding is supposed to break over dither patterns -- talk with TO about where the guide star is wrt to the annulus. [Look into the idiosyncrasies of this system]