*** The Official Astronomy & Universe Thread ***

Soldato
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Well the Arecibo is well and truly dead :( apparently suffered a major, and expected collapse, after the previous cable failures. The central receiver and the tops of the towers have collapsed.
 
Associate
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Well the Arecibo is well and truly dead :( apparently suffered a major, and expected collapse, after the previous cable failures. The central receiver and the tops of the towers have collapsed.

Its odd that scientists, people that deal in facts and logic can get emotional over a few lumps of inanimate metal. And i for one and very sad about it.

Its really sad to see that collapse, it was such an iconic astronomical instrument, and for a lot of lay people it was something they knew about.

Other than the Parkes telescope i can't think of another one thats so well known, other than Hubble of course.
 
Soldato
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Well the Arecibo is well and truly dead :( apparently suffered a major, and expected collapse, after the previous cable failures. The central receiver and the tops of the towers have collapsed.

Yep, slowly falling to pieces through sheer laziness and incompetence. Sad news.


Is anyone surprised though given how the infrastructure in the US is going the same way?
 
Man of Honour
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Just seen the pictures and some video of the Arecibo radio telescope. :(

Completely destroyed now. Looks like cable failure and a small earthquake caused it.

*doffs scientific hat*


 
Associate
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A funeral. Without a body. A symbol of human compassion. The long finger of tragic coincidence, stretching across a billion miles of space. Is this the end or the beginning? Where does the universe end? Where does it begin?

:eek: Sad end to an iconic piece of history? or perhaps the possibility to build a new one...
 
Permabanned
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Its odd that scientists, people that deal in facts and logic can get emotional over a few lumps of inanimate metal. And i for one and very sad about it.

And when the TV loses it's picture we thump it, rip it's cables out and throw it in the bin, with absolutely no remorse.
 
Soldato
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RxR

RxR

Soldato
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Nice to see the mainstream media catching up, they're only a few years out of date.

I think the point was they just cracked the laser configuration code needed to make it happen. The Starshot Project hadnt solved that problem till just now. So, another part of the how-to is solved.
 
Man of Honour
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On a brighter note (millions of lasers) some folk recently figured out how to send a minisat to Alpha Centauri in 20 years travel time. Which could send back reports to some OCUKers still alive thereabouts.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06...r-sail-interstellar-space-discovery/100198228

If there is one thing I'd have liked to do is live long enough to see something like Starshot send back the first images of planets, etc. from a star outside our own solar system.
 
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