After each deadline for telescope requests passes, we examine the results for changing patterns in the proposals received. Requests for the spring semester of 1997 were higher than those for the fall 1996 semester for nearly every telescope, except for 4-m bright time, and the change at the 2.1-m was particularly dramatic. At this telescope, we are offering the Phoenix high resolution IR spectrometer for the first time, and we received requests for 100 nights---thereby more than doubling the oversubscription of bright time at this telescope! This example is an illustration of how demand increases when new instrumental capabilities become available.
A complete analysis of the proposals will be given in the next Newsletter after the TAC meets, but the following table estimates the oversubscription rates in terms of number of nights requested for fall 1996 and spring 1997. Note especially the high oversubscription rate for the Schmidt. This rate is directly traceable to the small number of dark nights (only 39) available on this shared telescope. When the CCD 8K X 8K mosaic imager is re-deployed with good CCDs, which are now on order, both the 0.9-m and the 4-m can be used for wide-field optical imaging and will help to address the shortfall in this capability.
Oversubscription Rates At Kitt Peak
Telescope Nights Requested/Nights Night Requested/Nights
Available: Fall 1996 Available: Spring 1997
4-m Bright 1.75 1.30
4-m Dark 2.10 2.57
WIYN Bright 0.80 0.75
WIYN Dark 1.80 2.90
2.1-m Bright 1.21 2.69
2.1-m Dark 0.95 1.15
Coude Feed 0.88 0.91
0.9-m Bright 0.76 1.03
0.9-m Dark 1.30 1.50
Schmidt 1.90 2.90
Sidney C.Wolff