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Comment by lnauta | Hacker News Reader

I got to visit the telescope earlier this year, its pretty cool. In a forest outside some small towns. For how well connected the Netherlands is, its pretty hard to reach.

We looked at the sun and some planets in radio frequencies (its all radio astronomy with LOFAR nearby).

That they can listen to Voyager with such an old instrument is incredible. It must help that the satellite is aimed at us.

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> That they can listen to Voyager with such an old instrument is incredible. It must help that the satellite is aimed at us.

It is indeed incredible.

Nitpick, but I'm not sure 'satellite' is correct in this context. Voyager is in a solar system escape trajectory.

You may be correct. In my head anything shot into space and still flying must be a satellite but that's a lazy shortcut.

The term that I always hear, is "probe."

I wanted to joke that it's a solar sattelite but nope... Galactic center sattelite maybe?

I think you'd have to demonstrate that the forces on its motion were dominated by motion relative to the galactic centre more than other effects, to get there.

Why does its age come in to play? The think they are listening to is old too. The main thing is the size of the dish that allows for it, and then the skills of the operators to find the weak signal in the noise.

Stuff breaks. Keeping it functional for a long time is impressive.

Arecibo failed to do so.

Indeed, it has been decommissioned for some 20 odd years now. But it's kept up and running by volunteers and became a national monument.

What's been decommissioned for 20 years now? I'm not really sure where you get your information from, but it's clearly not correct.

Decommissioned Announced November 19, 2020 Collapsed December 1, 2020

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_Telescope

They were referring to Dwingeloo [1] in the Netherlands, the telescope used in this article, not Arecibo. It stopped officially operating as a radio telescope in 2000, and has since been used for a variety of astronomy and amateur radio projects.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwingeloo_Radio_Observatory

Because the object you are receiving a signal from is further, thus necessitating more sensitive receiving equipment that couldn't have existed in the past?

I don’t buy that premise at all.

Superconducting detectors and materials science have obviously advanced leaps and bounds in the last 30 years: it's really not up for debate or a premise that can be "bought."

It made a big impression on me as a kid when visiting the telescope with my family. The exhibition outside taught me about Pluto's weird orbit and made me a Pluto fan.

I went there again with my own kids a couple of years ago and it was a bit disappointing. Not much to see. The solar system walk at the WSRT at Westerbork nearby is still cool.

I think it was deliberately built in a more remote area to avoid interference from other signals? When I was a kid (25 years ago :-)) I went on holiday in that area a few times, there were signs to tell people not to use radio equipment in the nature areas around the telescope.

It's cool that they kept it operational for amateurs and education.

It’s pretty much my backyard. I wonder what will happen to the WSRT when maintenance will inevitably become an issue.

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