On the drive home from the Bosque

[Ian Cassell]

I passed the VLA radio-telescope site on my drive back to Phoenix from the Bosque and couldn't resist a brief stop. You may remember this from the movie "Contact" with Jodi Foster. These are huge! Each of those dishes is 25m across and weighs 230 tons. There are 27 of them layed out in a Y-shape. They are on railroad tracks so they can be moved around (maximum separation is ~ 22 miles). They were all huddled pretty close together when I was there. (Read more about it here: http://www.nrao.edu/index.php/about/facilities/vlaevla )

Canon 7D
Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6 @ 14mm
1/125sec f/25 ISO 400 HH

Crop and levels in CS5

[Christopher Miller]

That's amazing, Ian. I never realized before that they move those huge dishes around. You learn something new every day.

[James Shadle]

Ian,
Thanks for posting this. That is one cool image, I'll bet it was something to see in person.
James

[Ian Cassell]

Thanks, James and Chris. It really is a cool place to visit and not far at all from the Bosque (about an hour West).