From: here@is.invalid   
      
   These days it takes a generation to build a great astronomical   
   observatory. A new one is taking shape in the Atacama Desert.   
      
   LAS CAMPANAS OBSERVATORY, Chile -- To walk among the observatory domes   
   of the Atacama Desert is to brush your hair with the stars.   
      
   The Atacama, on a plateau high in the Chilean Andes, is one of the   
   driest and darkest places in the world. During the day one can see to   
   Bolivia, far to the east, where clouds billow into thunderstorms that   
   will never moisten this region. At night, calm, unruffled winds off   
   the Pacific Ocean produce some of the most exquisite stargazing   
   conditions on Earth.   
      
   One evening in late January the sky was so thick with stars that the   
   bones of the constellations blurred into the background. The Milky   
   Way, our home galaxy, was rolling straight overhead, and the Large and   
   Small Magellanic Clouds, satellite galaxies of our own, floated   
   alongside like ghosts. The Southern Cross, that icon of adventure and   
   romance, loomed unmistakably above the southern horizon.   
   ...   
   ...   
   The Carnegie Institution is a founder of and a driving force behind a   
   consortium of 13 universities and institutions that aims to build the   
   Giant Magellan Telescope, or G.M.T., a multibillion-dollar instrument   
   more powerful than any existing ground-based telescope.   
      
   When completed, the telescope will have seven mirrors, each eight   
   meters in diameter, that together will act as a 22-meter-diameter   
   telescope, roughly 20 times as powerful as Palomar. The G.M.T. will be   
   built at the top of Cerro Las Campanas, two miles from the domes of   
   the Carnegie's existing telescopes.   
      
      
   https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/18/science/astronomy-telescopes-   
   agellan-chile.html   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)