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Cody Trepte

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The Number 2 Mirror Incident

The 3rd of November 1970 was scheduled to be a routine monthly maintenance shutdown. The East Auxiliary #2 mirror was being lowered down the telescope when its hoist cable slipped off of the drum. The carriage raced down the tunnel incline about 30-meters before impacting the main #2 mirror carriage! The East Auxiliary’s 0.9-m aluminum mirror broke free of its mounting and fell another 5-meters onto the main #2 carriage. The 1.6-m main imaging mirror was seen to “jump about 2 inches”. When the mirror settled back into its support, the clips at the mirror edge broke a roughly 15-cm round chip from the front edge (Figure 11).  

Wednesday 07.05.17
Posted by Cody Trepte
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