Nasa’s stratospheric Observatory for infrared astronomy (SOFIA) or if you don’t want to be smart airborne telescope, took its first flight yesterday.
As you can see from the image a door opens in the 747 so that the telescope can see the sky. It may sound odd to be flying around with a telescope hanging out the back but there are some obvious advantages flying at 40,000 feet above the grubby atmosphere below. It’s an infrared telescope that would be a little bit blinded by water vapour on the ground and therefore can see a lot more. Being in an aircraft it can obviously fly anywhere around the world so it can chase certain events. The final advantage is that its equipment can be updated as technology advances over its 20 year life span.
It wasn’t all plain sailing and the project was nearly cancelled in 2006 due to overbudget problems with the final pricetag being $3.4 billion.
They won’t say what they are looking at at the moment but they will release images in a day or two.
Sofia Telescope
SOFIA with Its Door Open
