Willard L. Eccles Observatory
University Of Utah
New Video and Images
Click here for the newest video of the Leonid bolide seen all over Utah!
Click here to see the first images taken with our new observatory.
Information
The Willard L. Eccles Observatory (WEO) is the next step for the University of Utah's Physics Department in becoming the Physics and Astronomy Department. Donations from the Willard L. Eccles and the E.R. Dumke & E.W. Dumke Foundations have made the expansion of the department possible through the building of a new observatory and the Eccles Foundation has also provided a grant to the Physics Department to become a full institutional member with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey III.
The University has purchased a 32 inch telescope from DFM Engineering. The scope is a Cassegrain design on an high precision equitorial fork mount. Plans to make the telescope robotic and controllable from a remote location are under way. The dome and storage facilities are finished and the telescope is installed. The observatory is not quite finished as of yet but hopefully will be soon. To see photos taken the first nights of operation go here.
After assessing availability, accessibility, atmospheric stability and sky darkness, the first choice for the observatory's location is Frisco Peak near Milford in Southern Utah. Locations holding an eleveation of approximately 9000 feet and higher have proven to be exceptional sites with seeing (an astronomers gauge of atmospheric stability) of one arc second on average. They are ideally in a central location between two major sources of light pollution, Salt Lake City and Las Vegas. Very dark skies are seen while there with the Milky Way visible without much dark adaption at night. Limiting visual magnitude (naked eye) at the sites on a dark night may be upwards of 5.7 to 6.0.
There is an exciting future in store for the Frisco Peak Observatory. The observatory may provide support for further observations for data obtained from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey III and will provide an instrument for teaching new Astronomy majors and astronomy graduate students in the upcoming astronomy program at the university and others around the state. Collaboration between BYU, USU, and the U will open up the skies to those future astronomers. Research in other fields of astronomy such as planet hunting, Gamma Ray searching, galaxy formation, and others will be possible and are being considered. Plans for public access and outreach will be determined in the next year.
