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Mount Wilson Observatory In Danger From L.A. Fire
An anonymous reader writes "Mount Wilson is in danger from the Station fire burning near L.A. Their servers have gone offline, but there's a temporary mirror cam. It doesn't look good. Picture twenty-four on the L.A. Times photo gallery shows the observatory from the air. If anyone has any inside news on the condition of the facility, I'm sure there are lots of people on Slashdot who would love to hear it."
I hope they can protect it! It would be a great tragedy to lose the observatory. Its beautiful architecture, unique location and accessibility to the public makes it a real treasure.
"Give a man fire, and he'll be warm for a day; set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life
Its not too far Oregon here, hope it misses the tower...
Someday we'll hit the human carrying capacity. And the band will just play on.
There is a link to a blog on the Webcam page:
http://joy.chara.gsu.edu/CHARA/fire.php
Chief Powers expressed his absolute confidence that they will save the Observatory. He said that while it may have appeared over the last day or so that the Observatory was being neglected, that they never lost sight of the importance of Mount Wilson's preservation and it is now their highest priority.
The observatory's going to be fine according to some of the people who work there.
I guess there's no such thing as a 100% guarantee, but the observatory appears to be very well protected.
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
I guess they have zero visibility now! It's melting, it's melting... Yikes... we'll miss them. Surely the glass mirrors could be destroyed in seconds or days without there even being direct fire burning the buildings... it's warping... it's warping... beam the telescopes up scotty... it was a far better thing that they have done... opening our eyes to the universe... to infinity and beyond...
Maybe they'll need those adjustable glasses retrofitted after? http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/josh_silver_demos_adjustable_liquid_filled_eyeglasses.html
A sad song of sorrow for the mechanical eyes that have showed us so much. May you rest in pieces.
Solar observer comment posted on September 1, 2009 at 10:32 P.D.T.
Current weather conditions: smokey
rewriting history since 2109
Wilson ? Wiiiiiiilsooooon !
</cast away>
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.
Gee, that explains all the taco stands.
Table-ized A.I.
"I can see the Big Bang! We finally got enough power to peer back in time and....what? fire? hill? Daaaah Shit!"
Table-ized A.I.
I live in Altadena and have a good view of Mt Wilson. Most of the flames are on the North side of the ridge today, and are therefore beyond line of sight. Smoke completely obscures the mountains in the morning hours as well. The press has been reporting for two days now that the fire was "hours away" from the observatory, but the ground crews and helicopters have been successful in protecting it and the antenna farm.
This afternoon, however, we were treated to the impressive sight of a Martin JRM Mars aerial water tanker dropping 7,000 gallons of water at a pop on the Mt. Wilson blazes, and seeing the black smoke turn to white steam. Better images here (scroll down 1/3rd of the page).
I'm confident that the firefighters will be able to prevent any serious damage to the assets on Mt. Wilson, both scientific and commercial. The worst appears to be over.
I can see the fnords!
The LA Times has been maintaining a Google Map showing the fire perimeter, location of landmarks like Mt. Wilson (it's the volcano shape on the lower-right side of the fire perimeter), and the direction the fire's been spreading. It's the best way I've found to quickly get an idea of what's going on:
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&gl=us&ie=UTF8&oe=UTF8&msa=0&msid=117631292961056724014.0004720e21d9cded17ce4
I've been living in Pasadena for a while, and this has been quite an interesting experience. My brother just moved out here from Florida, and he arrived at our house the other night telling me how huge the fires on the mountain looked. I thought to myself, "Oh, he's just impressed because he's never seen this sort of thing before" -- I've seen wildfires on the mountains north of here in the past, and even if they cover a huge amount of area they still look fairly small from ~13 miles away. I then walked to the middle of our street where I could get a view of the mountains, and then exclaimed, "Holy crap, the mountain's on fire!" That was shit was insane.
Friends of mine have had to evacuate already, the air perpetually smells like smoke, and a lot of people are wearing breathing masks. This is crazy. I really hope the historic Mt. Wilson observatory can be saved, and that the loss of life/property can be minimized.
If you haven't seen it yet, I'd suggest the wikipedia article for the fire, which has things like satellite photos of the fire and more information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/August_2009_California_wildfires
I thought they'd see it coming.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
KPCC (a local NPR affiliate) had a piece on Mount Wilson yesterday. A point that was brought up by one of their experts is that they were more likely to lose electricity and/or T1 lines than suffer serious structural damage. Normally backup power systems would make electricity loss minor, but the air filters for them are not designed to cope with the extreme smoke.
This combined with how much work has gone into preserving the area makes me cautiously optimistic that the damage won't be too severe. We'll know more in the morning.
As common as mold in Seattle.
It's there
Get use to it
About 34 hours before the cam went offline, I decided to start grabbing the images for a time lapse in case it did go dead. I put it here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-H6awKq9AA
From what I've heard, the firefighters have been preparing for quite some time making fire breaks and other preparations. There are also a lot of firefighters there, as it is a top priority. The only way that I can see it going down is if the winds pick up. If they got going fast enough, the wind would blow super hot embers over the fire breaks and over run the firefighters. Strong winds have been known to throw embers well over a mile, so if they did pick up, it wouldn't be that hard for one to land on the observatory.
Parent's 100% accurate. I spent lots of time mountain biking up there many (15??) years ago and know the destination well.
The priority goes to not only the observatory, but the *many* radio and television antennas up there that service the most densely populated parts of L.A. When we used to stop there before descending on some beautiful single track, the grounds were very well kept. Hopefully that hasn't changed too much.
The steepness of the San Gabriel mountains along the south-facing sides just cannot be described. There's just no way to reasonably manage the fuel loads beyond a small perimeter around the top of Mt. Wilson. Taxpayers are in no mood to fund that sort of effort.
Hopefully, they've been managing the area as well as I remember.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
Anyone who was in Canberra around 2003 is going to find this spookily familiar. The Mount Stromlo Observatory was pretty much destroyed by a bush fire in that year. It was especially sad because it could have been saved except that the firefighters were focused on Canberra suburbs and towns like Tharwa. Also, a CCD they were building for an international telescope got left behind in the panic. Stromlo was historically important but past its best as an observational sight by that time.
Astronomer Mike Brown is tweeting his observations of the fire (from the "9th floor of Caltech Lib w/AC and comfy chair") on a very regular basis during daytime hours, in case anyone wants an eyewitness account from fairly close by. Just follow @plutokiller for his updates.
How is an observatory this close to major population centers not horribly affected by light pollution?
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
omg polution and clima danger, where are All Gores when you need them?!
God's gift to chicks
"saved except that the firefighters were focused on Canberra suburbs and towns like Tharwa"
I hate to break the news to you but I suspect that for 99.999% of the population saving their homes is a bit more important than saving a completely non-essential government funded facility. Thats not to say what happened to the scope wasn't sad , but the emergency guys got their priorities spot on.
My brother-in-law used to be the maintainer for the telescopes up there several years ago, and is up there right now with the firefighting crews (has been for a few days now). The mountain has been in danger several times but firefighters are there in full force (well, 150 is the number I hear). From his perspective I've been getting mixed information - a lot of the news has come in via what people up there see, and what they see isn't always what's really happening (we heard an entire Christian camp up there was completely burned down, but it's actually just fine!).
A lot of the media here is hyping up the 20+ communications towers at the top of the mountain being in danger, and just started talking about the observatory recently (running out of things to talk about after days and days of coverage, I guess). It is a critical communications point, but so far between the flame retardant, back burn (?) fires started now to prevent areas from burning in the immediate future, actual firefighters and planes/helicopters dropping water/retardant, it's looking really good. The winds have died down as well which is helping quite a bit. I'm currently in Palmdale which is a bit north, and the other day it was "snowing" ashes!
One guy close to the action on the news today downgraded the fire from "angry" to "cranky" - good to hear for all of us still riding this out.
I know scrub fires have always happened in California , but is this year particularly bad or is the media just focusing on it because it happens to be threatening LA suburbs for once instead of a few hick towns 50 miles from nowhere?
Sorry , thats not meant to be patronising , but thats the way I think the media see it usually (not me personally).
Been in CA for a year now, and after a few months here had a chance to climb the 'hill' (1500') behind my house and see a relatively large fire that was about 50 miles away. Although I couldn't see the flames because they were on the other side of the mountains from where I was, the smoke clouds... wow. Absolutely stunning, if you didn't know any better you would swear that a good old fashioned A-bomb had gone off. That sick pinkish hue and the mushroom shape were really creepy to look at.
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/aust-03a.html
They haven't rebuilt, and never will. Partly due to disputes with the insurer. Partly due to apathy from government. Partly for the very good technical reason that there is too much light pollution there now.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Hot ,Sweaty, high pressure - with depression rolling in.
Air quality low due to pollution.
Y'all have a nice day now.
I just watched the Macgyver pilot with my kids -- I'd never seen the show before because I didn't have a TV when it was on. I was surprised to see that Macgyver apparently lived in the Griffith Observatory building. Maybe he haunts it like the Phantom of the Opera.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
KPCC has at least daily interviews about the status and expectations of the fire with the observatory director and the interviews may be available on line.
Nate
Taxpayers are in no mood to fund that sort of effort.
Correct me if I'm wrong, I'm under the impression that both the police and fire departments have had layoffs as part of the state's budget cuts, in an attempt to keep the government quasi-solvent during its' current financial crisis.
In "The Trap" (or was is "The Century Of Self"?) BBC documentarian Adam Curtis mentions the phenomenon of John Q. Citizen groaning about taxes, electing a man like Reagan as president, then a couple of years later groaning about the decaying conditions of infrastructure, education, law enforcement, etc, not making the connection between his vote and the consequences. Now, instead of going into a diatribe about fickle and myopic masses unable to wisely govern themselves, I'll just state a fact: you get what you pay for, including a weakened firefighting force.
Unfortunately, I know exactly what these people are going through, I get knots in my stomach every time this makes the news. I live in Baja, and during a Santa Ana event on November 23, 1999 (I'll never forget the date, it was a Tuesday), I woke up to the roar of a brush fire in the canyon behind my rented house, even though it was already daylight, the sun was blocked out by smoke and an orange glow danced in darkness through the curtains, a sight I do not wish on anybody. In an instant I bolted out of bed, made way through rooms thick with smoke like a indoor fog, evacuated my crying cats (a mother and five kittens) and ran barefoot through rocks and shrubs to a neighbor's house to phone the fire department, who assured they were on the way.
Here's the thing, a PVC water pipe that feeds the colony runs through the back of the house, and as it's only turned on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays (we're not on the grid), the pipe was dry. This particular morning, it was also charred to a crisp. When the firemen arrived to another house first, the pump was switched on, and as pressurized cold water hit the pipe behind my house, it cracked on top, sending a huge curtain of water upwards, which was then pushed by the wind towards the roof. My gods (BSG, nod nod, wink wink), it was like a waterfall on all four sides! By the time the firemen finally made it to my place, it had already saved itself. The only casualties were my feet (had to use a cane for about a week and a half) and charred whiskers on the mother cat, but we made it through. To this day, there are scars and burns where the flames licked the structure.
Next morning, with a churning stomach I gazed at a huge cloud of smoke rising from the other side of town, so I was baffled to see the previous day's fire truck slowly approach my house. One of the firemen came up and asked if I'd seen his gloves around, as he'd lost them and they were his only pair. Here they were, losing a crucial hour or more, to find a pair of gloves.
This is what happens when a vital department is underfunded and undermanned.
Since then I've gotten married, every year we hire someone to clear out a perimeter of at least twenty meters of dry brush and dispose of it. Still, sometimes when the dry winds hit, I do suffer from mild episodes of PTSD, which makes sleeping a real challenge for a few days, until the humidity returns.
Lil' Thindime, lilting a lacrimose lament, krashes the kwaint konfines of Kokonino Kounty
Its actually just smoke, but interesting non the less.
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=40011
The LA times photos of burnt/melted cars was interesting as well (picture 25).
Everyone seems to be aware of the historic Mount Wilson observatory, but there is also the CHARA array on Mount Wilson. It has 6 ~1m telescopes that are linked together as an interferometer studying evolved stars, binaries, and young stars in the near-infrared at extremely high resolution. A colleague of mine just shipped an instrument to the observatory that was been under construction for the past 3 years. So it's not just history and communications towers, it's also a cutting edge scientific facility. I hope it survives, it would be shame if his new instrument was lost as well as the lost research potential for his Ph.D. students.
Sorry, but state and local governments both have as many (or more) problems as the Federal government. - Anonymous Coward from Chicago, Illinois
I am going up there tomorrow. I will let you know.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-0826-morris-fire-pictures,0,2039975.photogallery