Welcome to the Machine v2.0
I climbed a seemingly endless number of stairs to a catwalk on the roof of the JCMT dome to get this photo. Measuring 15 meters across, JCMT is the largest submillimeter dish in the world. It's also the only telescope to have been stolen by pirates, but that's a different story...
The dish is never exposed directly to the atmosphere--it has a Goretex tarp over it. The tarp is transparent to submillimeter wavelengths, so the telescope can see right through it. See here for a different view of the inside of the dome.
Welcome to the Machine v2.0
I climbed a seemingly endless number of stairs to a catwalk on the roof of the JCMT dome to get this photo. Measuring 15 meters across, JCMT is the largest submillimeter dish in the world. It's also the only telescope to have been stolen by pirates, but that's a different story...
The dish is never exposed directly to the atmosphere--it has a Goretex tarp over it. The tarp is transparent to submillimeter wavelengths, so the telescope can see right through it. See here for a different view of the inside of the dome.