A quick inspection of the Vatican Advanced Technology Telescope (VATT) revealed no obvious damage from the Frye Fire, whose flames had come perilously close as firefighters dropped slurry and set back burns to protect it and the two other telescopes of the Mount Graham International Observatory.
“We were quite surprised at what little damage there was,” said Father Paul Gabor, an astronomer and vice-director of the Vatican observatory, after visiting the telescope Tuesday.
No damage was reported at the other telescopes, though all lost valuable viewing time and won’t reopen before the scheduled monsoon shutdown next month.
The site is running on generator power, said Buell Jannuzi, director of the University of Arizona’s Steward Observatory, which developed and operates the site.
Power lines have been de-energized for the safety of the crews fighting the fire.
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The Large Binocular Telescope, owned by the UA and international partners, and the UA’s Submillimeter Telescope escaped damage as well. “We lost observing time but nothing else,” he said.
Jannuzi noted that “the fire is still going,” but said he is confident the team fighting the fire will continue to keep the observatory safe as it did on June 18 with back burns and drops of fire retardant from planes.
“It was very frightening a few days ago,” he said.
Gabor said the VATT sports a coat of “pinkish-orangish slurry all over the place. Inside, it smells of smoke but there are no soots or carbon deposits” on the observatory’s sensitive optical and electronic equipment, he said.
Gabor made the trip up the winding road to the telescope Tuesday morning when winds were light.
On the way down in early afternoon, the winds had picked up and spot fires were visible along the road, he said.
Gabor packed up two cameras for their routine summer maintenance but did not have time to test the rotation of the dome, which he had worried might have been warped by the heat.
It seemed to be undamaged, he said. “It was much better than I had hoped.”
The Frye Fire has burned across 38,500 acres of the Pinaleno Mountains, southwest of Safford. It started with a lightning strike on June 7.
It was 43 percent contained, according to the Wednesday afternoon report from the interagency team of 850 fighting the fire.
