Some Giant Telescopes
Updated August 5, 2020 |
Infoplease Staff
| Radio (dish-antenna) telescopes: | The fixed-dish telescope (1963) near Arecibo, Puerto Rico: 1,000 ft (305 m) in diameter, covering 25 acres. |
| Very Large Array (VLA) radio telescope (1980) near Socorro, N.M. It has 27 mobile dishes, each 82 ft in diameter. | |
| The fully steerable radio telescope (1972) at Effelsberg, Germany: 328 ft (100 m) in diameter. | |
| The fully steerable radio telescope (2000) at Green Bank, W. Va.: 328 by 360.89 ft (100 by 110 m) in diameter. | |
| Optical (mirror) telescopes: | Hale telescope (1948) at Mt. Palomar, Calif. The reflector is 200 in. (5 m) in diameter. |
| W. M. Keck telescope (1991) at Mauna Kea, Hawaii. Its primary mirror is composed of 36 hexagonal segments, each 5.9 ft (1.8 m) across. | |
| The European Southern Observatory (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT) at Cerro Paranal, Chile. It consists of four 27-ft (8.2-m) telescopes that can work independently or in combined mode. In the combined mode, the VLT has the total light-collecting power of a 52.5-ft (16-m) single telescope. | |
| The Yerkes Observatory 40-in. (1.01-m) refractor telescope (1897) at Williams Bay, Wis. | |
| The National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) Subaru telescope (1999) at Mauna Kea, Hawaii. Its single mirror is 27 ft (8.2 m) in diameter. | |
| The Hobby-Eberly Telescope (HET) at the McDonald Observatory in West Texas. Dedicated in 1997, HET has a 9.2-m (433-in.) mirror. | |
| The Gemini North and Gemini South twin 26.6-ft (8.1 m) telescopes. Gemini North (2000) is located atop Mauna Kea, Hawaii, and Gemini South (2001) atop Cerro Pachón, in the Chilean Andes. | |
| The Multiple Mirror Telescope (MMT) in Arizona. The telescope's primary mirror measures 21.3 ft (6.5 m) in diameter. It went into operation in 2000. | |
| The Magellan I (2000) and Magellan II (2002) twin telescopes at the Las Campanas Observatory in the Chilean Andes. Both have mirrors measuring 21.3 ft (6.5 m) across. | |
| BTA (Bolshoi Teleskop Azimutalnyi, or “Large Altazimuth Telescope”) on Mount Pastukhov, in the Caucasus Range, Russia. The 19.7-ft (6-m) reflector telescope went into operation in 1976. |
See also Evolution of Telescopes
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