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Green Bank Telescope Goes Live

Posted by Hemos on from the listening-to-the-stars dept.

ptbrown writes: "The world's largest steerable radio telescope is being dedicated today at Green Bank, W.Va. The 100 meter Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope (named after a West Virginia senator) is 485 feet tall, weighs 16 million pounds, cost $75 million, took almost 10 years to build, and is expected to last for at least 25 years. The telescope it replaces (designed to last 10 years) collapsed in 1988 after only 26 years. This is a pretty unique dish: assymetrical, side-mounted feed arm, movable surface panels, and laser-assisted ranging. And they give tours, so if you're ever around southern West Virginia think about stopping by. "

3 of 136 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Radio waves for sight? by chgreer · · Score: 5

    Light is just a part of the electromagnetic spectrum that runs all the way from radio waves (very low frequency and long wave lengths) to stuff like gamma rays (high frequency and short wavelengths). All of these are 'light' in a sense and carry useful astronomical data.

    For example, many galaxies (known as radio galaxies) emit strongly in these low frequency bands and a telescope such as this allows them to be observed so we might get some clue as to what's going on.

    Radio telescopes must be huge to achieve a decent resolution, which goes as (wavelength)/(size of aperature). In this case wavelength is on the order of centimeters to meters and aperature is on the order of 100 meters.

    Also, the Very Large Array, as seen in the adaptation of Carl Sagen's Contact is a radio telescope.

    See NRAO for some examples of what radio astronomy is all about.

  2. More info :) by seanmeister · · Score: 5
    AutoCAD drawings of the new telescope, equipment room rack wiring diagrams, and some other interesting stuff are available a former Green Bank observatory employee's homepage.


    Sean

  3. Left out by thesparkle · · Score: 5

    "The 100 meter Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope (named after a West Virginia senator)"
    has been nicknamed, "The Porkbarrel" out of respect for the free-spending representative and his spending practices since arriving in Congress.

    Besides the 75million taxpayer dollars for the telescope, 44 million dollars in highway improvements were also added to the area. In addition, 22 million dollars was allocated with the project to maintain West Virginia's Fort Wayne, the only US Army post still servicing stage coaches and mule wagons for our nation's armed forces. Finally, a 14 million dollar grant was included with the telescope money for a new medical study into the benefits of leeches in medicine for the University of West Virginia.

    Thousands of the Senator's supporters turned out for the festivities including government subsidy recipient Marla Thornhill of Buck Hill, WV. "My tobacco farm would have been closed down if it had not been for the generosity of Senator Byrd. Without those tobacco subsidies, I would have to quit growing the stuff and switch crops. Millions of Americans have to be thankful for Senator Byrd's committment to the family tobacco farm".

    Senator Byrd was expected to arrive later today aboard an Air Force C141 cargo jet along with 40 of his staffers before leaving for a fact finding tour of Bermuda for the next week.