Wednesday, July 25th 2007
Today we found ourselves on the road to Mt. Graham, a two-hour drive to base camp, and another hour to the 10,700-foot summit. We met with Father Christopher Corbally at base camp. Father Corbally is the vice-director of the Vatican Observatory on the mountain. After the long, windy drive to the summit, we learned a little Latin from Fr. Corbally, and then moved on to an incredible interview.
Finishing up at the Vatican Observatory, we made our way across the peak to what is currently the world's largest and most advanced telescope, the LBT (Large Binocular Telescope). The LBT is under constant development, but certain aspects are fully functional at this time. It can currently run as two individual scopes, but in the near future, a process known as interferometry will enable the scope to combine the images from it's 8.4 meter mirrors into a single image with up to 10 times the resolution of the Hubble - amazing!
LBT Director Dr. Richard Green explained the inner workings of the scope, it's engineering advancements and how this scope’s revolutionary technology is breaking new ground for a whole new breed of large telescopes.
We got off the mountain about 9pm, and back in to Tucson around midnight. It was a long but productive day.