*Better launch carefully; imagine the years of bad luck from breaking a mirror that size.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7864087.stm
Stare into the curve of Herschel's mirror too long and you get a slightly giddy feeling that comes from not being able to judge where its surface really starts.
It is enchanting, spectacular and - at 3.5m in diameter - it will soon become the biggest telescope mirror in space, surpassing that of Hubble. (((Nyaaah nyah nyah.)))
The great 18th Century astronomer William Herschel would have been astonished by the silver sensation that now bears his name.
The design keeps Herschel's critical detectors in an ultra-cold state.
The European Space Agency (Esa) is certainly very proud of its new observatory. It has been working on the venture for more than 20 years.
(((Almost three broken mirrors' worth.)))
"The mirror is an enormous piece of hardware," enthused Thomas
Passvogel, Esa's programme manager on the Herschel space observatory.
"It's a ceramic mirror; it's the biggest piece ever made from silicon carbide. It's very hard but much, much lighter than glass and the performance is excellent." (((As the Japanese like to say,
"Europe is a boutique and America is a farm.")))
This week, the finished observatory will be flown to Europe's
Kourou spaceport in South America. There, it will be bolted to an
Ariane rocket and hurled into orbit.
It will take up a vantage point a million-and-a-half kilometres from Earth, to open up what scientists expect to be an utterly fascinating new vista on the Universe....
