Arecibo Observatory

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Message 2062328 - Posted: 27 Nov 2020, 18:13:27 UTC

Streaming LIVE NOW (on Facebook): What happened to Arecibo? Join Space.com's Chelsea Gohd
The full video presentation will be viewable after the session is over also
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Message 2062644 - Posted: 1 Dec 2020, 15:02:45 UTC

The suspended receiver of the Arecibo observatory has fallen down onto the reflector dish, presumably destroying itself, and further damaging the dish. The only bright spot I can see here is that this probably simplifies the dismantling process somewhat. Please see the link below for further details:

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/huge-loss-huge-puerto-rico-radio-telescope-arecibo-collapses-following-n1249515
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Message 2062645 - Posted: 1 Dec 2020, 15:04:29 UTC

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Message 2062650 - Posted: 1 Dec 2020, 16:14:39 UTC

And another view on the very sad news :-(
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/12/arecibo-telescope-collapses-ending-57-year-run?fbclid=IwAR290rCl9KD1MWtXy4W9OuZmKvwoOoDBFTNLPTZ1fhj1uM9Reowh2quxJbE
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Message 2062667 - Posted: 1 Dec 2020, 19:17:14 UTC

Scott Manley's thoughts on the failure mechanism:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vchDbyIRP44
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Message 2062669 - Posted: 1 Dec 2020, 19:52:46 UTC

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/arecibo-observatory-radio-telescope-puerto-rico-collapses/

The telescope collapsed late last night. Its totally destroyed.
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Message 2062683 - Posted: 1 Dec 2020, 21:38:13 UTC - in response to Message 2062669.  

Very sad news. I would like to see it enlarged, modernized and rebuilt. Arecibo still maintained some unique capabilities, even with the larger single dish antenna now online. We have lost the most powerful radar telescope and planetary radar we had, and we have lost some of those abilities for the time being at least. I believe that the facility was good for Puerto Rico and the U.S., and in fact the whole World. Look at all the data that we have crunched that was captured by that very telescope. A sad day. It was inspirational, and we need to rebuild it, but bigger and better. Rich
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Message 2062716 - Posted: 2 Dec 2020, 6:11:30 UTC

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Message 2062860 - Posted: 3 Dec 2020, 20:30:59 UTC - in response to Message 2062716.  

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Message 2062862 - Posted: 3 Dec 2020, 20:37:30 UTC

Please find a link, below, to a couple of videos. They show the moment of the collapse of the Arecibo receiver, onto the reflector dish, below, from two different points of view. One gets a sense of the scale, and the weight of the structure, especially from the first video. The slowness of the process, the noise, and the dust raised make for a rather alarming spectacle. The second video shows the support cable failing, then an alert camera operator re-aims on the just fallen receiver.
https://www.theverge.com/22150330/arecibo-observatory-collapse-drone-footage-video
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Message 2062864 - Posted: 3 Dec 2020, 20:50:42 UTC - in response to Message 2062667.  
Last modified: 4 Dec 2020, 1:52:41 UTC

Scott Manley's thoughts on the failure mechanism:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vchDbyIRP44

Scott surmised correctly and with good detail, as seen directly at the time:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3AASKr_iHc

(Note, as already linked recently by other posters.)

Rather a sad loss of unique capabilities. All the more sad for the sake of petty politics, and the false economizing, for (not) funding our Science...


What next?!

Keep searchin',
Martin
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Message 2062866 - Posted: 3 Dec 2020, 21:05:13 UTC

Curious was it just lucky happenstance they had a drone out videoing the cable anchor point when the cables failed? Or did they have some estimate of the failure event?
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Message 2062870 - Posted: 3 Dec 2020, 21:30:03 UTC - in response to Message 2062866.  

The National Science Foundation has been monitoring Arecibo with drones since the last cable failure. It's immanent collapse has been considered a serious possibility from that point onward.
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Message 2062934 - Posted: 4 Dec 2020, 15:11:23 UTC

No money NO FUN.
Unbelievable, they didn't pay to save the construction.
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Message 2063114 - Posted: 7 Dec 2020, 13:32:42 UTC

In the USA a campaign has started to get Arecibo rebuilt - links to a petition to the US government, via the White House:
https://setiathome.berkeley.edu/forum_thread.php?id=85654

(I don't know if this is open to non-US residents)
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Message 2063139 - Posted: 7 Dec 2020, 23:08:14 UTC
Last modified: 7 Dec 2020, 23:09:16 UTC

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Message 2064196 - Posted: 23 Dec 2020, 8:06:27 UTC

I signed the petition. Rebuilding the Arecibo telescope, along with providing access to greater discoveries, could help at least some of Puerto Rico's economy.
Bob DeWoody

My motto: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow as it may not be required. This no longer applies in light of current events.
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Message 2064819 - Posted: 2 Jan 2021, 11:04:32 UTC

https://www.engadget.com/puerto-rico-approves-8-million-to-rebuild-arecibo-telescope-155454170.html

I truly hope this comes into fruition.
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Message 2065687 - Posted: 14 Jan 2021, 2:12:36 UTC
Last modified: 14 Jan 2021, 2:12:48 UTC

Nice article on National Geographic by Nadia Drake about Arecibo.
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Message 2065726 - Posted: 14 Jan 2021, 17:06:33 UTC

The NANOGrav team at Boulder, Colorado, has used almost 15 years of data from Arecibo and Green Bank measuring the times of arrival of signals from 45 pulsars to detect low frequency gravitational waves, that cannot be detected by interferometers like LIGO, VIRGO and Kagra. They announced it today and published an article on Astrophysical Journal Letters.
Tullio
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