Start On West Melton Observatory Soon
Construction of the Canterbury Astronomical Society’s new observatory at West Melton would be started to the next two to four months, said the president (Mr F. P. Andrews. “We hope the observatory will be operating by early summer, and research programmes should be getting really under way by the beginning of next year.” It would be the best amateur observatory to New Zealand, and among the best equipped to the Southern Hemisphere, and would compare favourably with amateur observatories anywhere else in the world. A dome 16ft in diameter will be built, equipped with a dark-room and small laboratory. Telescopes to be installed include a 14|to shortfocus reflector, and a 17to long-focus reflector. The latter will have extremely heavy equatorial mounting, designed for spectroscopic, photo-elec-tric, and photographic work. Research in these fields will be conducted at the observatory. A separate building will house special satellite-track-ing equipment supplied by the Smithsonian Institution of America. This will comprise two wide-angle telescopes of five-inch aperture and also an assortment of wide-angle cameras. Mr Andrews said that most of the money for the project had come from the R. F. Joyce bequest, made jointly to the Royal New Zealand Astronomical Society and the Canterbury Astronomical Society. The site at West Melton had been chosen, after some testing, three or four years ago. It was fenced off, and one observatory had already been built. This had a 6ta photographic telescope, which had been used mainly to assess the suitability of the site. Now the site had been levelled and surveyed for the new observatory. The buildings would be of retoforced-
concrete block, and the dome of steel with an aluminium covering. “Facilities will be available for people who are genuinely interested in astronomy, and who wish to gain a basic understanding of the use of astronomical telescopes," Mr Andrews said.
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Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30809, 22 July 1965, Page 7
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311Start On West Melton Observatory Soon Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30809, 22 July 1965, Page 7
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