Holy Cow! Watch the Arecibo Observatory's catastrophic collapse caught by multiple cameras
[www.cnet.com]

Honestly, this is worth seeing...from various cameras including a drone shooting a closeup of the tower tops as the cables exploded!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/2020 01:15PM by Steve G..

Heartbreaking.

How wild is that. Filming a close-up of the failing cable when it snaps!

They said back in Nov that they'd be doing a "controlled disassembly." This was obviously not it. I wonder if they were planning on saving the underlying structure to be able to rebuild or whether a 57 year old facility is just completely obsolete.

That was amazing to watch.

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As good a visualization of the year 2020 as I could possibly have documented.

Sad, sad to see.

I bet that drone pilot had to change his underpants after that!

JPK

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sekker
As good a visualization of the year 2020 as I could possibly have documented.

You are absolutely right. It's another gift from the horrible year 2020.

A sad day

The Aricebo facility wasn't obsolete by any means, but repairs from the previous cable failures were deemed too expensive/difficult, so they planned to dismantle it in a controlled way.

It's a tremendous loss for astronomy. There's only one other facility on Earth similar to it, based in China. I read that there are plans to build a new facility in Puerto Rico to replace it, but I don't know if it will be built on the exact same site. Funding of course has to be secured.

I find it hard to believe that maintenance costs would have been more than the cost of having to build an entirely new replacement.
Like many things bequeathed by the Greatest Generation - the heirs just let them fall apart rather than pay for the upkeep.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/2020 03:57PM by SDGuy.

I bet that drone pilot had to change his underpants after that!


I was thinking the exact same thing, and wondering what it's elevation relative to that cable.

The drone camera may have a longer lens than I've seen, given that I've only been looking at consumer drones.

I was wondering if this was deliberate, given the drone was at that place and time, but apparently not.

Can you imagine what would have happened of someone or a team would have been up there trying to repair it?

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JPK
I bet that drone pilot had to change his underpants after that!

JPK

I was going to write the same thing. Holy crap!

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SDGuy
I find it hard to believe that maintenance costs would have been more than the cost of having to build an entirely new replacement.
Like many things bequeathed by the Greatest Generation - the heirs just let them fall apart rather than pay for the upkeep.

Ehhh...

Although this IS a great loss for astronomy, I can't help but wonder if the original designers had any idea that Arecibo would last and be in use for as long as it was, and that provisions to make major maintenance such as regular/eventual cable replacement reasonably easy were ever a part of the original design parameters to begin with.

For once, a web search yields the results I wanted: Sure enough, the platform was constructed on the ground and lifted into the air via cables, then the dish was constructed underneath it. A simple, expedient, and perfectly logical way of doing things but it leaves no easy way to support the platform if/when the cables need replacement. My guess is that the original designers figured Arecibo would be in use for 20 years, 30 tops, before something newer and better came along to render it obsolete so they designed it to last that long with no or minimal maintenance and how any major maintenance would be performed was never even a consideration.

Pics of Arecibo's construction: [www.naic.edu]

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SDGuy
I find it hard to believe that maintenance costs would have been more than the cost of having to build an entirely new replacement.
Like many things bequeathed by the Greatest Generation - the heirs just let them fall apart rather than pay for the upkeep.

When that cable failed, I don't think repair cost was the issue, I recall a statement that there was no SAFE way to repair that failed cable.

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SDGuy
Like many things bequeathed by the Greatest Generation - the heirs just let them fall apart rather than pay for the upkeep.

No doubt...

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GGD

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SDGuy
I find it hard to believe that maintenance costs would have been more than the cost of having to build an entirely new replacement.
Like many things bequeathed by the Greatest Generation - the heirs just let them fall apart rather than pay for the upkeep.

When that cable failed, I don't think repair cost was the issue, I recall a statement that there was no SAFE way to repair that failed cable.

I'm pretty sure the idea of preventative maintenance is to avoid letting things fall apart in the first place, before they break and need to be repaired.

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GGD

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SDGuy
I find it hard to believe that maintenance costs would have been more than the cost of having to build an entirely new replacement.
Like many things bequeathed by the Greatest Generation - the heirs just let them fall apart rather than pay for the upkeep.

When that cable failed, I don't think repair cost was the issue, I recall a statement that there was no SAFE way to repair that failed cable.

I believe SDGuy was referring to ongoing maintenance and cable replacement over the life of the observatory. From information that was included in some reports a few weeks ago, examination of the cables showed deep corrosion damage. That is what led to the consultants determining there was no safe way to do the repairs.

Suspension cables like this get regular maintenance and sometimes replacement when used in bridges and similar structures. From reports this was not being done at Arecibo. So all of the cables were in bad shape, not enough strength left to provide any safety factor during an operation to replace them now.

Part of the issue was that over a decade ago in 2006 NSF cut funding amounts to the observatory. It sounds like they were not able to get sufficient funding from other sources to make up the difference.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/2020 07:37PM by JoeH.