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Arecibo Observatory Collapsed

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Re: Arecibo Observatory Collapsed

#4

Post by est31 »

I've heard that radio astronomy was greatly supported by the military because it can be used to monitor for incoming ICBMs. I guess if Arecibo were still used for such purposes, they wouldn't have let it fall into disrepair. How is such monitoring conducted in this day and age?

Re: Arecibo Observatory Collapsed

#5

Post by JoeAltmaier »

est31 wrote: post #4

I've heard that radio astronomy was greatly supported by the military because it can be used to monitor for incoming ICBMs. I guess if Arecibo were still used for such purposes, they wouldn't have let it fall into disrepair. How is such monitoring conducted in this day and age?

Tracking is mostly done space-based. Because of political issues. In our moon shots, we frequently had 'blackouts' in tracking the Apollo capsules because it was over unfriendly or uncooperative nations who wouldn't share their ground station data.

It was my wife's school friend Marjory Bacon that headed that project. (She was also the person who turned on the Hubble telescope and initiated the first self-diagnostic)

Re: Arecibo Observatory Collapsed

#7

Post by clon »

What a sad day for our species.

John Michael Godier made an interesting interview with Saptarshi Bandyopadhyay regarding placing a radio telescope on the far (silent) side of Moon. Notably, our moon is also obviously devoid of the ionosphere, but what is less obvious, is that this would allow us to observe wavelengths that have so far never been studied by humans.

https://youtu.be/8c8tG1sAK78

Re: Arecibo Observatory Collapsed

#8

Post by _ph_ »

A sad moment. Of course it didn't come surprising after recent news, still it is painful to see it collapse. Obviously, the funding had shifted to other projects some time ago or it had not fallen in disrepair. This probably means, the scientific output was less promising than those projects. Yet, beyond its immediate use, it was one of the very visible symbols of science and it hurts to see it go. I wonder whether there should be plans made for a completely new rebuild?
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