Roads on wheels: Day 11 contd : Hanle Observatory

Home

We reached hanle late in the evening and where very hungry. The locals guided us to a place where we can get some food(maggi). Soon after we reached a tata mobile from Leh arrived there. It carried all the essential commodities required by the hanle ppl and also a few locals returning from leh. The jeep then moved to Chumur, the adjoining village(less we knew that it will take more than 1/2 day to reach the 'adjoiing' village). As we went in we where surprised to see laptops, wireless mouse, keyboard and many for gadgets. Ya its hanle, the highest observatory in the world and its no surprise to see these gadgets.

Each had some two servings of maggi and rested there for a while. have a look at the Kitchen

We then came and went to the hanle's ground base. This is where the technical assistant stays. They take 2 weeks shift. i.e one guys works there for 2 weeks and goes back to leh and the other guy moves over here. There is another guy is in charge of getting the Telescope opened up properly. From the base we called the engineer. As he was busy there, we had to wait. He then called us back and asked for our permission letter. After he confirming with his Boss in bangalore he asked us to come. he gave his appointment at 6 so that we can see the opening up of the telescope and the initial steps. So we had to wait for a solid 3 hr.

we lazed around the base for an hour

BTW what are these two pics about a nebula?

We saw a few boys playing volley ball near the base. Mohan joined then while me, Sumit and Chetan were spectators. later I joined, and once the ball rolled down a steep. The boys 'ran up and down' and go the ball. What a stamina !! Then around 5 we got a call from the Observatory asking us to start. We jumped into the scorpio and moved.

Its still raining near by

This is the setup made by NASA. they have a similar thing exactly on the other side of the earth, so that they can get a 360 degree view of the universe.

The Drive up was quite quick and we greeted the engineer at the Observatory. he took us inside and after climbing many a step we reached the top. he then turned on the telescope. The view from inside was wonderful. As soon as the lens was exposed we saw liquid nitrogen flowing down. The heat from the converged rays will be so hish that liquid nitrogen is used to cool it.