California Wildfires Threaten 105-Year-Old Observatory
By Margaret Foster | Online Only | Sept. 8, 2009
In 14 days, the so-called Station Fire has become the largest in Los Angeles County, consuming 160,357 acres and destroying 78 houses. U.S. Forest Service officials say that arsonists started the blaze.
Today firefighters are planning to start several contained blazes in the San Gabriel Mountains above Pasadena, Calif., in an attempt to protect the historic Mount Wilson Observatory and the modern telecommunications center there.
"I'm guessing [the fire] is four miles away," says Hal McAlister, director of the nonprofit Mount Wilson Institute and one of five civilians that fire officials have asked to remain on the mountain to provide logistical assistance. "The observatory is very well prepared. There are a lot of firefighters here, a lot of hoses here," McAlister says. "Frankly the observatory has never been in such good shape" because of all the brush that has been cleared away, he says.
The Mount Wilson Observatory, founded in 1904 on a 5,700-foot peak above Pasadena, consists of more than 50 buildings—including a 1937 museum—on 40 acres. The observatory became one of the most significant in the world after a powerful telescope was installed in 1917. Astronomer Edwin Hubble used that 100-inch telescope in the early 1920s to make his famous discovery that the Milky Way is one of many galaxies.
The Station Fire has given the famous telescope a new purpose. Firefighters on Mt. Wilson are taking shelter in the building that houses the instrument, waiting for flames to arrive.
"It's very eerie," McAlister says.
Read McAlister's blog at http://www.mtwilson.edu/fire.php
For a current view of the observatory, visit http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~obs/towercam.htm
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