Atlantis over Tenerife

Japanese astronaut Sochi Noguchi took this iconic picture of the Space Shuttle Atlantis over the Atlantic Ocean and the island of Tenerife. The picure was taken from the International Space Station on Sunday, May 16 2010 at 10:28 am EDT (1428 GMT) while the Atlantis was getting ready for docking. At that time the ISS was about 350 km above the ground. This was the flight before the last one for the shuttle. In the highest resolution, the white towers of the solar telescopes at the Observatorio del Teide (IAC) are visible between the clouds. To help your eyes, I took a snapshot from the Google Maps: look for the distinctive dark patches in the NASA picture, the towers are tiny white dots just above them.

Credit: NASA/Sochi Noguchi (click for hi-res)

Credit: Google Maps (click to go to the interactive map)

Vacuum Tower Telescope (VTT), Teide Observatory (Tenerife, Spain)

This Wednesday I had a chance to assist an observation at the famous VTT (with E.Khomenko and M.Collados). The telescope is one of the most productive instruments in solar physics. The diameter of the primary mirror is 700 mm. The left picture shows the heliostat - it follows the Sun during the day and directs the light into the telescope. The right one shows the tower from the ground. It's an 11-storeys building!

It was a lot of fun to be there. Can't wait the next opportunity!

Solar telescope at the Terskol observatory (Caucasus, Russia)

These pictures were taken in March 2006 during a solar-eclipse campaign. The top one shows the heliostat of the large horizontal solar telescope of the Peak Terskol Observatory (Kabardino-Balkaria, Caucasus, Russia) at 3100 m of altitude. The entire building in the middle picture (behind the heliostat) is the actual telescope. The bottom photography shows the interior of the telescope with the primary mirror (D=650 mm). More about this amazing instrument you can find on the website of the observatory and in Burlov-Vasilev et al (1996). However, behind this telescope is a great human power of my dear friend Olexa Andriyenko. Working with him was one of the best experiences of my life.

Dutch Open Telescope (DOT), La Palma (Spain)

The Dutch Open Telescope is very easy to recognize. With its look of an extraterrestrial space ship, it is so different than all the other solar telescopes (well, not only solar) in the world. The minimalistic construction is very important concept as it enables an efficient natural cooling. The diameter of the primary mirror is 450 mm and the focal length only 2 m . These pictures were taken in October, 2007 during an USP-SP workshop at the DOT. The dome of the telescope is retractable (closed in the bottom picture). The DOT website.