ELT site testing — Cerro Armazones / Chile

The above panorama shows a view of the Atacama Desert as seen from the ESO Paranal Observatory, home to the Very Large Telescope. To the right of the image, one can see the road leading to the summit of Cerro Armazones, a site located in Chile, and a possible home for the future Extremely Large Telescope (ELT).

The ELT programme office has studied half a dozen potential sites for the future ELT observatory, which, with its 40-metre-class diameter, will be the world’s biggest eye on the sky. Various aspects need to be considered in the site selection process. On the ELT Site Selection Advisory Committee’s final short list for the recommended site, Armazones is also the committee’s preferred site, because it has the best balance of sky quality across all aspects and can be operated in an integrated fashion with the existing Paranal Observatory.