Have you seen the James Bond movie ‘Golden Eye’ (1995)? If yes, do you remember the large satellite dish in a dramatic fight scene? Yes! We are talking about the world’s largest radio telescope at Arecibo, Puerto Rico. Recently it caught much public attention as the officials announced the closing of the telescope forever. But before that, this legendary telescope said goodbye to all of us in a most dramatic and unexpected way. Yeah, yesterday the telescope collapsed. As per the report, telescope’s 900-ton instrument platform fell onto a reflector dish some 450ft (137m) below.
It is a heartbreaking news to the scientific community. Arecibo telescope, consisting of a 305-meter spherical reflector dish was built in 1963. It was chiefly used to carry out observations in radio astronomy, atmospheric science and radar astronomy. And it’s contributions in these fields are legendary. Arecibo telescope was used to accurately determine the rotational period of mercury in 1964. The first binary pulsar (in 1974 by Hulse and Taylor) and the first confirmed extrasolar planet was all discovered at this site. Above all, Arecibo is the source of data for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) project.
A few weeks back, the US National Science Foundation (NSF), which owns Arecibo observatory, decided to decommission the telescope as the telescope had suffered two catastrophic failures of cables over the past months. The harm that these cable failures caused to the telescope is severe and there is no way to safely repair the damage. The only way left to avoid a catastrophic failure which would threaten nearby buildings is a controlled decommissioning.
“This decision is intended to preserve life and safety of people and prevent the loss of the entire Arecibo Observatory, including the visitor education center, in the event of an unexpected and uncontrolled collapse. This decision is not an easy one for NSF to make. But safety of people is our number-one priority,” said Sean Jones, assistant director of the Directorate for Mathematical and Physical Sciences at the NSF.
Ralph Gaume, director of NSF’s Division of Astronomical Sciences, had said that the agency was not planning to close the observatory though the telescope is being decommissioned. They were planning to retain as much as an infrastructure that surrounds the telescope, which might have been useful for various research and educational purposes.
Definitely the observatory is one-of-a-kind due to its enormous size and specialised hardware. Even though many parts of the research that were carried out in Arecibo could be done with the help of other facilities, there aren’t any facility currently available for many applications in astronomy and planetary science, that was once done with the help of Arecibo. Which is why it is a huge loss for the scientific community. Arecibo’s powerful radar transmitter has helped researchers in characterizing fully the orbits, size and shapes of many near earth object, under the Near Earth Object (NEO) Observations program, funded by NASA. Thus, it enabled in studying the hazards that these NEOs may cause if they strike Earth.
Researchers are looking forward to China’s 500-meter Aperture Telescope (FAST), opened in 2016. Recently, China announced that the facilities available at FAST are opening up to other collaborators, which is a good thing. But the only thing is that FAST doesn’t have a transmitter as Arecibo had, which makes it currently unable to conduct radar studies. Clearly, the void that the demolishing of the Arecibo telescope causes, is irreplaceable.
References: The U.S. National Science Foundation
Author
