Arecibo radio telescope’s massive instrument platform has collapsed

The immense instrument platform and the large collection of cables that supported it, all of which are now gone. (credit: NSF)

On Monday night, the enormous instrument platform that hung over the Arecibo radio telescope's big dish collapsed due to the failure of the remaining cables supporting it. The risk of this sort of failure was the key motivation behind the National Science Foundation's recent decision to shut down the observatory, as the potential for collapse made any attempt to repair the battered scope too dangerous for the people who would do the repairs.

Right now, details are sparse. The NSF has confirmed the collapse and says it will provide more information once it's confirmed. A Twitter account from a user from Puerto Rico shared an image that shows the support towers that used to hold the cables that suspended the instrument platform over the dish, now with nothing but empty space between them.

Science had a great lost, it's a very sad day for the community & for Puerto Rico. The world's very first single dish observatory, the #AreciboObservatory has collapsed this morning. Seeing 1 of our reporters break down live while getting the news just pic.twitter.com/Bl2FJjjPkt

- Heidi Milagros (@zonhei) December 1, 2020

The immense weight of the platform undoubtedly caused significant damage to the disk below. The huge metal cables that had supported it would likely have spread the damage well beyond where the platform landed. It's safe to say that there is very little left of the instrument that's in any shape to repair.

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