E-ELT blasting from very close-up

Today a groundbreaking ceremony took place to mark the next major milestone towards ESO’s European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT). Part of the 3000-metre peak of Cerro Armazones was blasted away as a step towards levelling the summit in preparation for the construction of the largest optical/infrared telescope in the world.

5000 cubic metres of rock was removed, as seen in this video from a distance of a few hundred metres. It was the first in a series of blastings aimed to remove a total of 220 000 cubic metres of rock for the 300 x 150 metres platform.