As I mentioned in another thread the iconic radio telescope in Puerto Rico has suffered damage 2 different times in 2020, and is now deemed too dangerous to work in or to even attempt repair. The US National Science Foundation is shutting it down and says it will be demolished.
Gaume and Ashley Zauderer, the program director for Arecibo Observatory at the NSF, said that the agency has hired engineers to develop a plan for a controlled decommissioning. Creating that plan and gathering the necessary approvals for it will take multiple weeks, they added.
The officials also declined to provide an idea of what that strategy would look like, although they mentioned the potential for helicopters or explosives to be considered.
In conjunction with the news conference, the NSF provided an engineering report from the firm leading the analysis of Arecibo Telescope after the second failure, which offers little more detail about the facility's fate.
"We believe the structure will collapse in the near future if left untouched," John Abruzzo, managing principal of Thornton Tomasetti, wrote. "Controlled demolition, designed with a specific collapse sequence determined and implemented with the use of explosives, will reduce the uncertainty and danger associated with collapse."
The severity of the situation stems from both the fact that two cables have already failed, and the way three separate engineering consultants were caught off-guard by the second failure. "The three expert companies that we brought in didn't provide any input or any inkling that there was an issue," Gaume said of the main cables after the August failure.
"It is, I think, just truly unfortunate that this main cable failed before we had a chance to get things stabilized," Zauderer said.
So remember when you're feeling very small and insecure How amazingly unlikely is your birth And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space Cause there's bugger-all down here on Earth
As I mentioned in another thread the iconic radio telescope in Puerto Rico has suffered damage 2 different times in 2020, and is now deemed too dangerous to work in or to even attempt repair. The US National Science Foundation is shutting it down and says it will be demolished.
Gaume and Ashley Zauderer, the program director for Arecibo Observatory at the NSF, said that the agency has hired engineers to develop a plan for a controlled decommissioning. Creating that plan and gathering the necessary approvals for it will take multiple weeks, they added.
The officials also declined to provide an idea of what that strategy would look like, although they mentioned the potential for helicopters or explosives to be considered.
In conjunction with the news conference, the NSF provided an engineering report from the firm leading the analysis of Arecibo Telescope after the second failure, which offers little more detail about the facility's fate.
"We believe the structure will collapse in the near future if left untouched," John Abruzzo, managing principal of Thornton Tomasetti, wrote. "Controlled demolition, designed with a specific collapse sequence determined and implemented with the use of explosives, will reduce the uncertainty and danger associated with collapse."
The severity of the situation stems from both the fact that two cables have already failed, and the way three separate engineering consultants were caught off-guard by the second failure. "The three expert companies that we brought in didn't provide any input or any inkling that there was an issue," Gaume said of the main cables after the August failure.
"It is, I think, just truly unfortunate that this main cable failed before we had a chance to get things stabilized," Zauderer said.
I saw this... super bummed about this. I'd always wanted to go see it. I have a friend from Puerto Rico who's driven by it a couple of times and says the thing is absolutely massive... pictures don't do it justice.
Really sad, but I guess in the long run, it doesn't really serve the same purpose it used to. There are far better Radio Telescopes... like the Very Large Array in New Mexico (which is awesome).
Nothing lasts forever... but it is sad to see something like this just go. I put it akin to something like the Iowa class battleships.
Arecibo has been on life support for years since they tried closing it before. Once cables had problem(s) is no surprise going to pull it down as no-one wants to send Many Millions to rebuilt most to all of it. Because very likely other cables need replacement not just failed cables. Towers and Anchors likely need complete rebuilt or replacement.
You have to remember it was built ~ 1960 likely w/ low bid contracts and been beaten again and again by about every storm hitting PR since even if you ignore other problems over 5 decades. About only surprise to many lasted this long.
------------------ Dr. Ian Malcolm: Yeah, but your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should. (Jurassic Park)
Engineering report several pages down says all cables likely need replace... I still think towers and anchors likely have problems too and need major work done.
"new" aux cable fail and broke first then OE cable fail later at ~ 60% of working load. Other OE cables look to failed but not broken completely right now.
It looks like it had a great run. Built in 1963. Wow! Over 50-years.
I'm so impressed what once we really built for science back in the 60s. From this telescope, to Nuclear plants, sending people to the moon, SR-71 Blackbird and etc.
Now, we don't do anything. All that is frowned upon because of the anti-science left. So we are left with our old impressive relics of the scientific past that really showed us what humanity is capable of when we cared about science and cooperation.
While we let our scientific wonder crumble and get decommissioned, such as this telescope, space shuttle (space program all together) and so much more. Because we care more about anti-science stuff like male and females are just social constructs and 2+2 doesn't equal 4 crap of post-modern anti-science thinking that has perpetuated into our institutions.
China presses on though.
China has one that is larger they built a few years ago.
IceCube South Pole Neutrino Observatory. Supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation. Affiliated with the University of Wisconsin at Madison. https://icecube.wisc.edu Click to show
[This message has been edited by rinselberg (edited 11-22-2020).]
SpaceX will try to repeat that performance later today from the Florida coast as it launches another batch of Starlink sats on a different flight proven 1st stage. Recovery is slated to be on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
[This message has been edited by maryjane (edited 11-22-2020).]
Originally posted by Wichita: China presses on though. China has one that is larger they built a few years ago.
China is mainly a PR stunt and maybe won't last long unless CCP will support it every year. That's ignoring any other problems hidden by CCP.
Why Arecibo has been looking for Big Pockets to take over cost to operate and maintenance from NAIC for 20+ years. NAIC has lost Fed and other Money for decades and now very little to no maintenance at Arecibo and some other places under NAIC control.
Chinese unit is bigger but Cannot do same job as doesn't use Radar and not likely to ever be upgraded for this. Very few single dish or arrays has Radar but far weaker then Arecibo. Manley touch on this near end of video is why link above.
SpaceX will try to repeat that performance later today from the Florida coast as it launches another batch of Starlink sats on a different flight proven 1st stage. Recovery is slated to be on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
No, Wichita is completely correct. Nerds, geeks, and dweebs run the show right now. These are the weirdoes who in high school used to play Magic the Gathering under the stairs in between classes. These are the kids who are socially awkward, lazy, entitled, and brainwashed. These are the people who are basically running the country by being the "squeeky" wheel. Politicians, only too eager to get and keep power, will cater to them. We even elected one of these community organizers in 2008. The Obama administration destroyed NASA... slashing funding and re-adjusting resources to things like Muslim Outreach and Climate Research.
Space-X is an anomaly that was only able to succeed because Government had continued to fail so badly. Boeing, Lockheed Martin, etc... are symptoms of Government fraud, waste, and abuse... and what happens to a company when it gets into bed with Government. Space-X is only able to be successful as it is right now because it's privately owned.
I will be SHOCKED... shocked if Biden puts any effort whatsoever into NASA... or advocate for it.
He didn't say "NASA" doesn't do anything. He said "Now 'we don't do anything" which I assume he meant the nation as a whole since he mentioned nuclear power plants, SR71, and whatever 'etc' entails. Both nuclear power (Westinghouse) and the Blackbird (Lockheed) were products of US private enterprise.
[This message has been edited by maryjane (edited 11-26-2020).]
Fans of "big" (literally) U.S.-based science facilities should not overlook the National Ignition Facility or NIF at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, an easy morning's drive inland (easy, aside from traffic) from San Francisco Bay.
In October 2010, in a building the size of three U.S. football fields, researchers at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory powered up 192 laser beams, focused their energy into a pulse with the punch of a speeding truck, and fired it at a pellet of nuclear fuel the size of a peppercorn. So began a campaign by the National Ignition Facility (NIF) to achieve the goal it is named for: igniting a fusion reaction that produces more energy than the laser puts in.
A decade and nearly 3000 shots later, NIF is still generating more fizz than bang, hampered by the complex, poorly understood behavior of the laser targets when they vaporize and implode. But with new target designs and laser pulse shapes, along with better tools to monitor the miniature explosions, NIF researchers believe they are close to an important intermediate milestone known as “burning plasma”: a fusion burn sustained by the heat of the reaction itself rather than the input of laser energy.
[This message has been edited by rinselberg (edited 11-25-2020).]
The religion of the left says a man can menstruate. They believe he can change sex despite the fact that his DNA remains male even after surgically removing an organ. They also say a mixed race person can be an African-American. Don't forget that silence is violence. Only White people can be racist. Rioting and looting is mostly peaceful protesting.
How can the right can be dangerous too? They think God is in control of everything and that scripture tells them to submit to government by doing nothing.
[This message has been edited by sourmash (edited 11-26-2020).]
How can the right can be dangerous too? They think God is in control of everything and that scripture tells them to submit to government by doing nothing.
[This message has been edited by MidEngineManiac (edited 11-26-2020).]
At the risk of turning the discussion religious, THAT is the problem with every-single-one-of-them.
Every single religion, and every single sub-variant of each of those is 100% determined that theirs is the ONLY way and everybody else is wrong.
(I say let them have a cage match to sort it out.)
And you will lose like always along with everyone else. The religious leftist cults always win, because they're insanely violent. Have you read history?
Religious Right and the Looney Left are both anti-science.
Canada is a bastion of leftist liberals, or so I've been told here in O/T. However, I don't think I've ever encountered anyone in my social circles who is "anti-science". Strange.
[This message has been edited by Patrick (edited 11-26-2020).]
It's a misconception for anyone to think that the United States is a place where "big" (literally) science no longer happens. Anyone who is wearing one of those "gimme" (freebie) MSBA-emblazoned baseball or trucker-style caps or hats with the visor or bill (MSBA: "Make Science Big Again") should take notice of these ramblings. I have returned to pick up where I previously stopped in this thread, which was at the "gi-normous" National Ignition Facility, not far from San Francisco.
I was part of a docent-led tour of the National Ignition Facility just a few years ago. In fact, it was an event of the Golden Gate Fieros chapter. There were just maybe five(?) of us, but the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory public affairs desk was happy to accommodate us.
Here's where I want to be now--at LIGO. "Be" in terms of messaging, as distinct from a physical presence. ("It depends on what the meaning of the word 'be' is.")
"The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO): Detecting ripples in space-time"
quote
The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) is a pair of enormous research facilities in the United States dedicated to detecting ripples in the fabric of space-time known as gravitational waves. Such signals come from massive objects in the universe, such as black holes and neutron stars, and provide astronomers with an entirely new window to observe cosmic phenomena.
CLICK FOR FULL SIZE
The LIGO project operates two ["gi-normous"] detector sites: one near Hanford in eastern Washington, and [this one] near Livingston, Louisiana. Image credit: LIGO Collaboration.
If anyone would like to "de-bus" (get off the bus) and take advantage of this latest stop on this SISB ("Science Is Still Big) messaging tour, here's their opportunity.
"The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO): Detecting ripples in space-time"
CLICK FOR FULL SIZE
The LIGO project operates two ["gi-normous"] detector sites: one near Hanford in eastern Washington, and [this one] near Livingston, Louisiana. Image credit: LIGO Collaboration.
I understand that a pitcher for the NY Mets is building a sign for the observatory at the Trump resort in Florida, using plastic interconnecting children's building blocks. But I haven't been able to find a picture Lugo's Lego Ligo Logo at Mar-a-Lago.
What a freakin' joke!
