national geographic Iconic radio telescope suffers catastrophic collapse

[UltraMega]

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The Arecibo Observatory’s suspended equipment platform collapsed just before 8 a.m. local time on December 1, falling more than 450 feet and crashing through the telescope’s massive radio dish—a catastrophic ending that scientists and engineers feared was imminent after multiple cables supporting the platform unexpectedly broke in recent months. No one was hurt when the 900-ton platform lost its battle with gravity, according to staff at the observatory in Puerto Rico.

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Source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/iconic-radio-telescope-suffers-catastrophic-collapse/ar-BB1bwRG3

 

 

I looked up what this dish was mainly used for most recently; it was used mostly to track asteroids. Funny how much more it looks like that bf4 map now. 

Edited December 2, 2020 by UltraMega

[mouacyk]

I'm always up on those towers sniping.

[Supercrumpet]

Saw this a couple days ago. Sad to see, but I wonder if they'll try to reuse what's left and rebuild or start fresh on this site or another one with modern tech and designs throughout.

[m4fox90]

I always forget that was there. I wonder if this was due to some residual damage from the hurricane?

[UltraMega]

Analyzing Video Footage Of Collapse of Massive Arecibo Telescope - YouTube

[ENTERPRISE]

Massive shame and much of it comes down to underfunding. I would imagine they will reuse the ground dish, needs repairs but a waste to destroy or abandon it.

[UltraMega]

  On 04/12/2020 at 20:27, ENTERPRISE said:

Massive shame and much of it comes down to underfunding. I would imagine they will reuse the ground dish, needs repairs but a waste to destroy or abandon it.

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Perhaps, but I think it's unlikely. I don't think there is any significant benifit to having one massive dish vs an array of smaller ones these days. The "telescope" used to picture a black hole was actually an array of small telescopes from around the globe. I think in the past it was difficult to compose all the data from muli-dish arrays into something useable and meaningful but with modern computers that is now a simple task.

Edited December 4, 2020 by UltraMega