Post by Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe on Dec 22, 2005 19:27:39 GMT -6
New Telescope to Revolutionize Asteroid Warning System
HONOLULU -- The Solar System is about to look a lot more crowded.
A group of telescopes using the world’s biggest digital cameras will soon start scanning the sky from the Hawaiian Islands, tracking down thousands of the smaller, dimmer and overlooked objects in the Sun’s neighborhood. The reason? Hunting for those dangerous space rocks that still elude detection.
When fully operational, the Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS) project will deeply scan most of the night sky several times a month. About three-quarters of the sky are visible from the Hawaiian Islands, and Pan-STARRS will use four linked telescopes connected to its enormous cameras to take broad pictures of unprecedented detail. Objects as dim as 24th magnitude—250 times fainter than objects detected by the current champ in asteroid spotting LINEAR—will pop out of the background and be analyzed for their threat potential.
In January of 2006 the first of the four will see first light, looking forward to when the entire system is operational in 2009. Pan-STARRS will bolster the Earth’s early warning system for threats from asteroids and comets—a congressionally directed program that currently consists of LINEAR (Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research), LONEOS (Lowell Observatory Near Earth Object Search), NEAT (Near Earth Asteroid Tracking) and Spacewatch.
More here: www.space.com/businesstechnology/051221_pan-starrs.html
Visit the Pan Starrs site:
pan-starrs.ifa.hawaii.edu/public/
and here:
starbulletin.com/2004/04/25/news/story3.html
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Pan-STARRS will cover 7 square degrees of sky at once -- 40 times the area of the full moon, excellent I say... ;D
