Coihueco

Yesterday, we were finally able to make it out to the site for our experiment. They have weather monitoring stations at all the four observatory buildings as they only want to open the observatory doors when the winds are fair. Two days ago the winds were so strong that they knocked out power to the site.

This is shot of the Andes on the way out to the site which take about 40 minutes or so to get to from Malargue.














Here you can see the pad where we will be installing our dish. In the background you can see one of the observatory buildings like at Los Leones. In this photo we finished laying out the brass ground screen which serves as a big mirror for radio waves to bounce the stray signals away from our experiment.















Here's a photo of the mounting post used to hold the dish.















While we were doing all this a pair of Andean condors flew overhead. I wasn't able to get my camera out and swap lenses quick enough to get a great shot, but this is the best I have. Andean condors have the largest wingspan of any bird, over 10 ft, which is larger than the California Condors however the California Condors are longer. The Andean condors are considered to be near threatened. They can live to be over 100 years old and are an unusual bird species in that males are actually larger than females.















Here's a photo of the dish on the stand. It's about 8 feet in diameter.














Here is on of the three HEAT buildings at the site. HEAT is a German experiment that is used to look for flashes of light in the sky, but looks up at a higher angle than the other buildings. They level the building to work on the telescope inside.







































































Here's a photo of some interested painted rocks on the drive back.