Arecibo shutdown

Yes. NSF has been trying to close Arecibo forever, and the first thing to be cut is maintenance.

With cable-suspended structures (like many bridges), rusting in the cores of the cables will always lead to failure of the entire structure. I'm sure that there was a cable-replacement schedule somewhere now forgotten, because nobody was ready to buck up the money.

Sort of like replacing HV transmission lines in California more often than once per century, with line lifetimes being 20-30 years.

Anyway, I bet that the NSF is in fact quietly happy now.

I doubt that Arecibo will be repaired. It may perhaps be replaced with a brand new modern telescope of similar purpose. The academic and practical infrastructure is already there.

Hmm. Except that the hollow in which the current dish was built is too small to compete with the new Chinese telescope of similar design. But Chinese competition may be just the ticket to get replacement funded.

Joe Gwinn

There was a bunch of swish gear up in the cryogenics/antenna-feed room, once the first cable snapped I bet nobody went back up there so it's all scrapified, now. :(