Monday, January 25, 2010

Mirror Support Engineering in Progress

If you saw the History Photo of the Week, posted earlier today, you know that we are just beginning a major, multi-week, engineering run on the Hale Telescope to clean and refurbish its 35 mirror supports.

You will be able to take peek at some of the action by looking at the Hale Telescope Web Cam. Unfortunately it doesn't provide too close a look at the action, but I will be posting information and updates here on the blog from time to time.

The action so far today has been mostly directed towards preparing for the work to come. The Cassegrain cage should be removed this afternoon which will provide easy access to each of the supports.

Weather Update: The weather on Palomar Mountain is wonderful right now. The engineering work has kept us from plowing the snow from the public parking area so we are still closed at this time.

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