“As we move forward, we will be looking for ways to assist the scientific community and maintain our strong relationship with the people of Puerto Rico.” “NSF is saddened by this development,” the independent federal agency wrote on Twitter. The NSF, which helped manage the telescope, said in November that efforts to repair the structure would be too dangerous and therefore it would have to be demolished. Two cables supporting the reflector dish had broken since August, leaving a gash in the dish and making the site unsafe, forcing officials to close the observatory. The Arecibo Observatory space telescope, seen in a satellite image taken over Arecibo, Puerto Rico It was also featured in two US films, GoldenEye starring Pierce Brosnan as James Bond and released in 1995, and Contact, with actors Jodie Foster and Matthew McConaughey two years later. The telescope, one of the largest in the world, had been used by scientists around the globe for decades to study distant planets, find potentially hazardous asteroids and hunt for potential signatures of extraterrestrial life. National Science Foundation December 1, 2020 NSF will release more details when they are confirmed. NSF is working with stakeholders to assess the situation. The instrument platform of the 305m telescope at Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico fell overnight. The radio telescope’s 900-tonne instrument platform, suspended by cables 137m (450 feet) above a 305-metre-wide (1,000-foot) bowl-shaped reflector dish, fell on Tuesday morning, the United States’ National Science Foundation (NSF) said. The massive telescope on the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico – located at the Arecibo Observatory and deteriorating since August – collapsed on Tuesday, officials said, after 57 years of astronomical discoveries.
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