On 10 March, an official ceremony took place on the 2,900m high site  of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) Operations  Support Facility, from where the ALMA antennas will be remotely  controlled. The ceremony marked the completion of the structural  works, while the building itself will be finished by the end of the  year. This will become the operational centre of one of the most  important ground-based astronomical facilities on Earth.
The ceremony, known as ‘Tijerales’ in Chile, is the equivalent to the  ‘roof-topping ceremony’ that takes place worldwide, in one form or  another, to celebrate reaching the highest level of a construction.  It this case, the construction is the unique ALMA Operations Support  Facility (OSF), located near the town of San Pedro de Atacama.
“The end of this first stage represents an historic moment for ALMA,”  said Hans Rykaczewski, the European ALMA Project Manager. “Once  completed in December 2007, this monumental building of 7,000 square  metres will be one of the largest and most important astronomical  operation centres in the world.”
ALMA, located at an elevation of 5,000m in the Atacama Desert of  northern Chile, will provide astronomers with the world’s most  advanced tool for exploring the Universe at millimetre and  submillimetre wavelengths. ALMA will detect fainter objects and be  able to produce much higher-quality images at these wavelengths than  any previous telescope system.
The OSF buildings are designed to suit the requirements of this  exceptional observatory in a remote, desert location. The facility,  which will host about 100 people during operations, consists of three  main buildings: the technical building, hosting the control centre of  the observatory, the antenna assembly building, including four  antenna foundations for testing and maintenance purposes, and the  warehouse building, including mechanical workshops. Further secondary  buildings are the transporter shelters and the vehicle maintenance  facilities as well as the ALMA gate house. The construction started  in August 2006 and will be completed in December 2007.
The ceremony took place in the presence of representatives of the  regional authorities, members of the Chilean Parliament, and  representatives of the local community, including the mayor of San  Pedro, Ms. Sandra Berna, who joined more than 40 representatives of  ESO, NRAO and NAOJ – the organisations that are, together, building  ALMA.
“This is certainly a big step in the realisation of the ALMA Project.  The completion of this facility will be essential for assembly,  testing and adjustment as well as operation and maintenance of all  ALMA antennas from Europe, North America and from Japan,” said  Ryusuke Ogasawara, the representative of NAOJ in Chile.
“This is a tremendous achievement and represents a major milestone  for the ALMA project,” said Adrian Russell, North American Project  Manager for ALMA.
The first ALMA antennas, the prototypes of which successfully  achieved their first combined astronomical observation last week, are  expected to arrive at the ALMA site in a few months. These huge  antennas will travel in pieces from Europe, USA and Japan and will be  assembled next to the OSF building.
The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), an  international astronomy facility, is a partnership among Europe,  Japan and North America, in cooperation with the Republic of Chile.  ALMA is funded in Europe by the European Organisation for  Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere, in Japan by the  National Institutes of Natural Sciences (NINS) in cooperation with  the Academia Sinica in Taiwan and in North America by the U.S.  National Science Foundation (NSF) in cooperation with the National  Research Council of Canada (NRC). ALMA construction and operations  are led on behalf of Europe by ESO, on behalf of Japan by the  National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) and on behalf of  North America by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO),  which is managed by Associated Universities, Inc. (AUI).
High resolution images are available at
