La Silla Facilities
La Silla, in the southern part of the Atacama desert, 600 km north of Santiago de Chile and at an altitude of 2400 metres is the home of ESO's original observing site.
Here ESO operates two major telescopes: the 3.6m telescope, and the New Technology Telescope (NTT). They are equipped with state of the art instruments either built completely by ESO or by external consortia, with substantial contribution by ESO.
La Silla Observatory is hosting regularly Visitor Instruments that are attached to a telescope, for the duration of a run of observation and then is removed from the telescope.
La Silla also hosts national telescopes, such as the 2.2-m Max-Planck telescope, 1.2-m Swiss Telescope and the 1.5-m Danish Telescope.
UPDATE October 2020
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, visitor runs until end of 2020 have been
converted into "designated visitor mode" (dVM). Instructions for dVM
observers are given at the following page:
Designated Visitor Information
During their run, observers can interact with the telescope/instrument
operator on a remote session, which is described at the following page:
End of Mission Report News
You will receive an email after your run with a one time password.
In Case of Emergency
Quick Links
- La Silla Paranal Observatory
- La Silla Wiki
- Paranal Facilities
- APEX
- Visitor Guidelines
- Visitor Instrument
- EFOSC2 Setup Form
- Sky Quality Meter (SQM)
Contact Information
Visiting the Observatory
- Please read the details about Visiting the La Silla Paranal Observatory sites
- Read more about La Silla and its History