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    Visiting Muana Kea Observatories

Chris on Mauna KeaThere are 13 working telescopes at the very top of the summit, operated by astronomers from 11 countries. The combined light-gathering power of the telescopes is 15 times more powerful than the Palomar telescope in California and 60 times more powerful than the Hubble!

The Keck Telescopes are the largest optical/infrared telescopes in the world. The summit possesses the largest infrared telescope (UKIRT) and the largest submillimeter telescope in the world (JCMT.)

The oxygen is approximately 60% of that at sea level, and you can be short of breath when walking or making sudden movements. It’s a little weird but you just have to go in “slow-mo” to decrease the effects. It was pretty cold, but not as cold as last year when we visited.

Mauna Kea Telescopes at Sunset

Sunset

Telescope Mauana Kea Summit

One of the telescopes

I video taped the sun setting, and still need to edit the video (I did it “still-shot,” so you can speed up the video and watch the sun move quickly! The colors were simply amazing. There was a cloud that had a rainbow embedded in it (lasted about 30 minutes,) and at one point, we could see the shadow of Mauna Kea on the cloud covering behind us (east side of the island.) We could also see the top of Haleakal (on Maui.)

After watching the sunset and talking with the Park Ranger (who gave us a lot of great information about the upkeep for the mountain,) we traveled back down to the Onizuka Center for International Astronomy (at 9300 feet.) They have telescopes set-up to view the planets and stars. There’s also a gift center. We all bought soup and coffee to help us warm up! The Center is named after Ellison Onizuka who gave his life on the 1986 Challenger. He was born and raised in Kona on the Big Island! We were fortunate to see a satellite fly over!

We traveled back to Waikoloa around 9:30pm to get organized for our trip to Kilauea, the active volcano on the Big Island. Thanks for reading!

Copyright 2012 Chris Anderson Hawaii Trip Report

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