One of the other things I was able to do this past weekend; was to visit the VLA.
"The Very Large Array, one of the world's premier astronomical radio observatories, consists of 27 radio antennas in a Y-shaped configuration on the Plains of San Agustin fifty miles west of Socorro, New Mexico."
Essentially, a friend of mine happens to work there, and I was able to get a tour! We set out around lunchtime, and even though it was the hottest time of the day; it was still only 28 degrees out... and there was alot of wind. It had been snowing off and on for a couple of days there.. and there was quite a bit of snow about. We saw fresh deer tracks (actually -- they were probably prongehorn antelope tracks), bird and bunny tracks... and one of the biggest jack rabbits I have ever seen in my life!
Anyway-- back to the VLA. We got an "insider" tour of the facilities and visitor areas... as well as the joy of getting up close and personal with a few of the beasts themselves. The antenna's configuration changes every few months to provide different data of the scenes they are viewing. When we happened to visit, the configuration was shut down... so it was actually a perfect time to see the structures.
"At the end of the VLA D configuration in 2010 Jan the VLA correlator will be turned off, and the VLA will not be available for an interval of up to 2 months while hardware is moved from the VLA correlator to the new correlator for the Expanded Very Large Array (EVLA)."
And yes, we even got to see photos of Jodi Foster from when she made the movie "Contact" there....link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118884/
--------->and so... here are the pix!
*all photos by Elaine A. Russell
For more info on the VLA; check out these websites:
Old website: (link:http://www.vla.nrao.edu/)
and their new website: (http://science.nrao.edu/evla/index.shtml)
"The Very Large Array, one of the world's premier astronomical radio observatories, consists of 27 radio antennas in a Y-shaped configuration on the Plains of San Agustin fifty miles west of Socorro, New Mexico."
Essentially, a friend of mine happens to work there, and I was able to get a tour! We set out around lunchtime, and even though it was the hottest time of the day; it was still only 28 degrees out... and there was alot of wind. It had been snowing off and on for a couple of days there.. and there was quite a bit of snow about. We saw fresh deer tracks (actually -- they were probably prongehorn antelope tracks), bird and bunny tracks... and one of the biggest jack rabbits I have ever seen in my life!
Anyway-- back to the VLA. We got an "insider" tour of the facilities and visitor areas... as well as the joy of getting up close and personal with a few of the beasts themselves. The antenna's configuration changes every few months to provide different data of the scenes they are viewing. When we happened to visit, the configuration was shut down... so it was actually a perfect time to see the structures.
"At the end of the VLA D configuration in 2010 Jan the VLA correlator will be turned off, and the VLA will not be available for an interval of up to 2 months while hardware is moved from the VLA correlator to the new correlator for the Expanded Very Large Array (EVLA)."
And yes, we even got to see photos of Jodi Foster from when she made the movie "Contact" there....link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118884/
--------->and so... here are the pix!
*all photos by Elaine A. RussellFor more info on the VLA; check out these websites:
Old website: (link:http://www.vla.nrao.edu/)
and their new website: (http://science.nrao.edu/evla/index.shtml)
*photo of the VLA.... by Elaine A. Russell