arecibo observatory

the arecibo observatory had been on my bucket list for several years, so i was beyond excited to include it on our trip.



the reflector dish is the largest one in the world. some nifty facts about the scale of this whole thing:

• the antenna (needle-shaped part, just to the right of center of this photo), is 96ft long
• if you look closely at the reflector portion (the dish at the bottom of the photo) you can see a faint grid pattern. that grid is actually the aluminum panels that make up the dish.
• each of those aluminum panels is approximately 3ft x 6ft
• the dish is made up of 38,778 of those panels
• the entire reflector portion weighs 300 tons

close up of the gregorian dome and antenna

one of the towers that supports the gregorian dome, the platform above the dome, and the antenna