Sutherland trip ix - Inside SALT

Posted by dobbino (Cape Town, South Africa) on 30 July 2009 in Miscellaneous.

This is not the greatest photo artistically speaking, but hopefully will be of interest to some of you.

It was taken from the second of the observation points at the SALT observatory, again from behind glass (the first allowed one to see into the control room). The main hexagonal subject that you see is the roof section that opens for observation purposes. At the bottom of the photo you see just some of the 91 interchangeable hexagonal mirror segments that make up the primary mirror for the observatory. Each mirror segment is 1 metre wide and weighs approximately 100 kilograms! The total mirror array spans 11 metres!

This mirror gathers 25 times as much light as our previous largest telescope - it's just phenomenal. The design was based on a modified version of the Hobby-Eberly Telescope in Texas.

The height to the top of the dome is approximately 31 metres.

All comments, and especially constructive criticism is truly appreciated. Thank you for taking the time.

All images © Rob Minter, and licensed in terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 South Africa License

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Comments (14)

Nicholas from Shah Alam, Malaysia

25 times light! :P No more macro lighting problem for me. Wonder what aperture I can shoot at :P

30 Jul 2009 6:08am

k@ from Paris, France

Very intriguing shot , love the light and shape of this giant machine Jules Verne would have loved !

30 Jul 2009 7:14am

Anina from Auckland, New Zealand

Love this shot!
Great lines and light

30 Jul 2009 8:32am

zOOm from Paris, France

A travel into space !

30 Jul 2009 9:13am

Veronique from Sarrouilles, France

very interesting, thanks for sharing these explanations

30 Jul 2009 9:57am

Fade ToBLACK from tehran, Iran

That's really great

30 Jul 2009 10:05am

grouser from Ludlow, United Kingdom

Good documentary stuff Rob. Re stargazing I can sort of imagine what you saw. Here up north of course we look out towards a spiral arm of the Milky Way and on clear nights where there is no light pollution you can see a clearly defined ribbon of stars in a band across the sky. Down south where you are you look towards the galactic centre and thus towards many more stars. I have never had the experience of the night sky south of the equator but it must be stunning.

30 Jul 2009 10:35am

@grouser: Thanks David - really appreciate your comment. For me the most fascinating part of the stargazing exercise was how the sky transformed over a period of about 90 minutes. At six in the evening, one could make out a couple of stars, then one could identify the Southern Cross, but then 60 minutes later it was really difficult to see. The rest of the stars and planets just filled the sky - it was just magical. In addition, my late Dad inspired me to look out for satellites, and both Jacqui and I do so to this day. Here we see one or two per week (if we're lucky), but that evening, in the space of 30 minutes or so, we must have seen at least ten! My only regret is that I didn't come back with any photos of the night sky - I just couldn't get anything worth showing. Even tried setting my camera on manual and on infinity settings, but no luck. Will just have to go back after learning how to do it properly!

MARIANA from Waterloo, Canada

Great shot . Light and shape is super !

30 Jul 2009 2:20pm

Lorraine from Gatineau, Canada

Wow providing us with the inside track, you are awesome !

30 Jul 2009 3:05pm

Michael Rawluk from Williams Lake, BC, Canada

I read your reply to grouser. I used to love spotting the satellites streaking across the sky so visible to the naked eye.
This is super cool. I am super jealous.

30 Jul 2009 4:47pm