It's done now
 

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/arecibo-observatory-collapse-173522919.html

https://s.yimg.com/ny/api/res/1.2/Hi...f-cf5942e81262

Sure looks like the right time to rebuild it with state of the art equipment. But NOT all financed by the USA.

That darn 007...

^^^ My first thought was Matthew McConaughey.

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That's sad...

Built between 1960 and 1963.
A lot of new tech between then and now.
Still sad though.

Been to San Juan a couple times....toured the Bacardi plant...fun! Never went to the Arecibo.

It is. I have been there.

I like going to large scientific sites. VLA, Wallops Island, the NASA sites, Palomar in the day, etc.

I am not sure it has any utility given Hubble, etc. I'll be interested to see what happens.

That's what I've been thinking as I saw the articles about the issues that have been occurring. As a young kid, I was always interested in planes, satellites, astronomy, etc..., so that dish has fueled my imagination for as long as I've been aware of it. Then throw Golden Eye and Contact, and it's pretty iconic, at least to me.

I'm not sure how much Hubble would impact Aracebo. Isn't Hubble optical and Aracebo is radio? So what seems more likely to impact Aracebo's usefulness is the large array or something like that. A bunch of smaller dishes that work in concert to combine to have a similar (greater?) sensitivity and efficacy than a single large dish. But I could be wrong. Paging Pazuzu...

Yep.... where's Pazuzu? Is this relic still worthwhile with all the smaller linked arrays spread all over and with the stuff we have in orbit now? Still sucks though...

I've been there more than once. Sad from an historical POV but technically very much behind. The site still has value for non-optical work, certainly as good a site as Green Bank W Va.

In other news a new skateboard park has just opened in PR.

I've been to the VLA. That WAS impressive.

Arecibo and VLA are radio telescopes. Hubble is optical. The VLA is far more capable than Arecibo due its size... VERY Large Array.

I am looking forward to what we will learn from the upcoming Webb telescope (optical Hubble successor).

I hope no one was hurt!

Only 006

Actually visited Aricebo back in the early 00's. It was kind of cool. The topography around the place is really strange. Like giant mounds (narrower and more vertical than what I consider to be a hill) scattered about, all covered in dense jungle-like foliage. The place seemed a little worn out already back then.

It was 40 years old by the time you visited.

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Aliens found our "mask" threads and cut off all communication.

Yes, you're describing the Very Large Array in New Mexico.

Arecibo and the VLA were both in "Contact", the movie.