The Balloon-borne Large Aperture Submillimeter Telescope (BLAST) 2006: Calibration and Flight Performance

TL;DR

The BLAST06 balloon-borne telescope successfully operated over Antarctica, achieving precise calibration and pointing, with detailed procedures and performance metrics for submillimeter observations.

Contribution

This paper presents the calibration procedures, accuracy assessments, and performance analysis of the BLAST06 telescope during its Antarctic flight.

Findings

Calibration accuracy of 10-13% across bands

Pointing error less than 5 arcseconds rms

Optics and pointing system performance validated

Abstract

The Balloon-borne Large Aperture Submillimeter Telescope (BLAST) operated successfully during a 250-hour flight over Antarctica in December 2006 (BLAST06). As part of the calibration and pointing procedures, the red hypergiant star VY CMa was observed and used as the primary calibrator. Details of the overall BLAST06 calibration procedure are discussed. The 1-sigma absolute calibration is accurate to 10, 12, and 13% at the 250, 350, and 500 micron bands, respectively. The errors are highly correlated between bands resulting in much lower error for the derived shape of the 250-500 micron continuum. The overall pointing error is <5" rms for the 36, 42, and 60" beams. The performance of the optics and pointing systems is discussed.