It is the site of two of the most productive 4-m class telescopes in the world, the New Technology Telescope (NTT) - the first major telescope equipped with active optics - and the 3.6-m, which hosts HARPSĮSO's First Observatory Celebrates 40th AnniversaryĮSO's La Silla Observatory, which is celebrating its 40th anniversary, became the largest astronomical observatory of its time. La Silla, north of the town of La Serena, has been the bastion of the organization's facilities since 1964.
Most recently, ESO has started the construction of an observatory at Chajnantor, a 5000m high site, also in the Atacama Desert.
It operates major telescopes on two remote sites, all located in Chile: La Silla, about 600 km north of Santiago and at an altitude of 2400m Paranal, a 2600m high mountain in the Atacama Desert 120 km south of the coastal city of Antofagasta. Created in 1962, ESO is now supported by eleven member states (Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom). It is my great pleasure to commend the excellent work of Jorge Melnick, former director of the La Silla Observatory, and of Roberto Gilmozzi, the director of Paranal." ESO's headquarters are located in Garching, in the vicinity of Munich (Bavaria, Germany), and this intergovernmental organisation has established itself as a world-leader in astronomy. Catherine Cesarsky, ESO's Director General, comments the new development: "The merging, which was planned during the past year with the deep involvement of all the staff, has created unified maintenance and engineering (including software, mechanics, electronics and optics) departments across the two sites, further increasing the already very high efficiency of our telescopes. The merged observatory will be known as the La Silla Paranal Observatory.
This move will help Europe's prime organisation for astronomy to better manage its many and diverse projects by deploying available resources more efficiently where and when they are needed. On February 1, 2005, the European Southern Observatory ( ESO) has merged its two observatories, La Silla and Paranal, into one.
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