Week 34 of the Early Operations system optimization period
Clouds and snow at Cerro Pachón continued to limit the on-sky time this week. The Simonyi Survey Telescope was fully closed on four nights and closed early on two other nights. All of the on-sky observations were for the pre-LSST campaign, mostly looking through clouds and with poor atmospheric seeing. There were no dedicated on-sky engineering tests this week given the conditions. The team continued to take calibration data and run thermal control tests for the primary-tertiary (M1M3) mirror.
The team has prepared multiple updates for the Active Optics System (AOS) to validate on sky at the next opportunity, and is planning several other on-sky engineering tests to gather diagnostic data to develop the next round of updates. Those tests will be interleaved with pre-LSST observations.
Perhaps an insight can be found in the following Astronomy magazine article, which says that the start of the survey is “days to weeks away”. This is a quote said on Tuesday, June 16, from Chris Smith, section head of the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Directorate for Mathematical and Physical Sciences (MPS). The article also quotes Jeff Carlin, NOIRLab community scientist, who said the survey could start “any day now.”
The Launch Estimate: Around the 1-hour mark of the video, Dr. Ivezic states that if no unexpected technical issues arise, the LSST survey could officially start in about a month and a half, which positions the target launch date for July 5, 2026
This is in 2 weeks.
Is this prediction still valid ?
Or do we have to see Bechtol’s huge smile coming again and again saying : “Week 52 : it was snowy” “week 104 : the image quality reached a new record”
They said 3 to 7 months after first light.
Then after first light in June 2025 they said in October. Then in October they said not before the end of the year.
Then… Bechtol : "Week 10" “Week 20” “Week 30” and now “week 34”… soon week 52 !
Now we are in June, 9 months after the first prediction for the launch.
So it was a relief to hear Dr. Ivezic saying finally “beginning of July”
But that was already 1 month ago.
I wish they could actualize the deadline estimate: Will it be in July really ? Or rather in August or September ?
"Week 10" “Week 20” “Week 30” and now “week 34”… soon week 52 ! 