What simply occurred? The Arecibo Radio Observatory situated in Puerto Rico has collapsed someday between late Monday night and early Tuesday morning. The radio telescope has suffered a number of cable failures within the previous months, and officers had cordoned it off for questions of safety. No person was harm within the collapse.
Final month, the Nationwide Science Basis determined there was no protected method to restore Arecibo’s assist cables, which failed in August and once more in November. The NSF decided it will be safer to take down the ability in a managed demolition. Nevertheless, earlier than it may even schedule the decommission, the construction finally failed, sending the 900-ton platform suspended above the telescope’s 1,000-foot dish crashing down.
Extra particulars concerning the collapse on the Arecibo Observatory’s 305-meter telescope can be found now at NSF’s web site: https://t.co/dCYLolC22L
Engineers are on-site. Prime priorities are sustaining security on the web site and assessing injury. pic.twitter.com/9mqnBx3dcU
— Nationwide Science Basis (@NSF) December 1, 2020
“We’re saddened by this example however grateful that nobody was harm,” stated NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan in an announcement. “Our focus is now on assessing the injury, discovering methods to revive operations at different components of the observatory, and dealing to proceed supporting the scientific group and the folks of Puerto Rico.”
Muy tristes las fotos desde el Observatorio de Arecibo. pic.twitter.com/7gByZLdPFF
— Deborah Martorell (@DeborahTiempo) December 1, 2020
Ayer fue la última vez que visite esta belleza de lugar. Lamentablemente agonizaba. Aquí imágenes de ayer y hoy. pic.twitter.com/jWuAwtUc1s
— Deborah Martorell (@DeborahTiempo) December 1, 2020
The NSF’s preliminary evaluation is that the tops of the assist towers suspending the platform gave manner. Certainly, before-and-after footage (see above tweets) from meteorologist Deborah Martorell present the tops of the encircling buildings seem to have damaged off. One other picture exhibits the radio dish totally destroyed. The NSF continues to be assessing methods to clear the location safely.
The Arecibo Radio Observatory was a analysis facility designed for varied astronomy duties, together with monitoring asteroids, however is extra well-known for its SETI (Seek for Further-Terrestrial Intelligence) work. Its iconic options have been made well-known within the 90s by the observatory’s a number of appearances in pop-culture media, together with the GoldenEye movie (1995) and online game (1997), the films Species (1995) and Contact (1997), and an episode of the tv sequence The X-Information (1994).
Picture credit score: Mia2you
