Several challenges will have to be faced by the staff at Paranal Observatory in order to be well prepared for a seamless integration of the ELT in the current VLT operations scheme. The Telescopes and Instruments Operator group (TIO) is already undergoing changes connected with some of the identified technological and operational needs for the ELT. This paper will have detailed information about the current training needs, group structural changes, the current activities using the adopted engineering-TIO [2] (eTIO) scheme and the staffing plan that will have to be applied in order to keep the centralized support of the biggest world infrastructure in astronomy at the time of the ELT, to handle daily science operations for seven different telescopes, the VLT interferometer and twenty-one scientific instruments in parallel.
We extend upon the initial analysis on the Evolution of Operations for the Surveys Telescopes at Paranal Observatory (C. Romero et al 2016) and follow on an ongoing Science Operation project. The operational complexity of some of the new generation instruments and facilities, incorporated into Paranal observatory, such as the AOF (Adaptive Optics Facility) will supposed a big challenge for all areas involved, including the operational one. Paranal Science Operation realized that adaptation to the complexity of this new systems, while maintaining the operational mode in vigor and the available resources, were feasible by releasing man power on the Telescope and Instrument Operators group. On this regard, Surveys Telescopes; VISTA (Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for astronomy) and VST (VLT Survey Telescope) were early identified as candidates to provide the more demanding systems with an additional support operator and since 2016, improvements on Surveys Telescopes (automatization, stabilities, operational panels and screens distribution at the console, among many others) has become a joint effort between MSE (Maintenance, Support and Engineering) and Science Operations, on this effort and as a way to cope with the limited resources, operators has took an important role on the analysis and development of this project. As well as on acquiring experience with the creation of new operational panels plus the maintenance of some operational scripts. Now the dry run for this new operational mode is set for January 2018 and a staff resource for future panels’ modifications is on the way.
Recently, the Science Operations department at the ESO-Paranal Observatory went through a series of changes, the one with the most impact goes by the name "SciOps 2.0", where staff changed the way they follow their daily work. In parallel to this development, a thorough analysis of the processes involved in the daytime coordination of Science Operations tasks led us to identify the need for an integrated task manager software [2]. In this contribution, we summarize the development process for such a tool (called "Dynamit"), the methodology used, and how it came to be from an idea in paper to a full production custom-made operations tool. This is a follow-up to the paper [2] mentioned above.
Observatories and operational strategies are evolving in connection with the facilities that will be built. For those new facilities, the strategy for dealing with the telescopes, instrumentation, data-flow, reduction process and relationship with the community is more or less handled from its conception. However, for those Observatories already in place, the challenge is to adapt the processes and prepare the existing people for these changes. This talk will show detailed information about current activities, the implemented training plan, the definition of the current operational model, the involvement of the group in projects towards improving operational processes and efficiency, and what new challenges will be involved during the definition of the strategies for the new generation instruments and facilities to be installed.
Paranal Observatory has a department called Science Operations (SciOps), which is in charge of operating the instruments within the global scheme established for the Very Large Telescope. This scheme was improved on what was called SciOps 2.0. The main operational goals of this new scheme were to strengthen the coordination of science operations activities within, and between, the department groups, by increasing the time allocated to “high-level” activities. It also improves the efficiency of the core science operations support to service mode (SM) and visitor mode (VM) observations, and the quality of the astronomical data delivered to the community of Paranal users.
In this context of efficiency and quality improvement of operations within the SciOps department, we had identified a strong need to optimize the management of daily operation tasks, via the development of a daily activity monitoring integrated tool, so this paper details the findings of the Daily Activity Monitoring Integrated Tool (DAMIT), the proof of Concept phase and the first delivered phase. The technical proof of concept was the first phase in development of a daily operation-monitoring tool for the science operations department. The primary objective of this phase was to evaluate the viability and impact of such a tool to improve the quality and efficiency of SciOps at Paranal.
This tool is running after overcoming the first phase of development, after followed an on-site technical analysis of the SciOps daily operation (day and night), the current procedures to certify the completeness and quality of the daily operations, and requirements for this new daily operation monitoring tool.
Since 2009, operations began at the Survey Telescopes at Paranal Observatory. The surveys aimed to observe using a large field of view targeting much fainter sources and covering wide areas of sky quickly. The first to enter operations was VISTA (Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy) and then the VST Telescope (VLT Survey Telescope). The survey telescopes introduced a change into the operational model of the time. The observations were wholly conducted by the telescope and instrument operator without the aid of a support astronomer. This prompted the gradual and steady improvement of tools for the operation of the observatory both generally and in particular for the Survey Telescopes. Examples of these enhancements include control systems for image quality, selection of OBs, logging of evening activities, among others. However, the new generation instruments at the Very Large Telescope (VLT) posed a new challenge to the observatory from a scientific and operational point of view. As these new systems were more demanding and complex, they would be more complicated to operate and require additional support. Hence, the focus of this study is to explore the possible development and optimization of the operations of the Survey telescopes, which would give greater operational flexibility in regards to the new generation instruments. Moreover, we aim to evaluate the feasibility of redistributing of telescope operators during periods of increased demand from other VLT systems.
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