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Haleakala Observatories

PS1 msss mees lco t4 zodiacal light

Latitude: 20.71552 Longitude: -156.169 Altitude 10,000

Because of the remarkable clarity, dryness, and stillness of the air, and its location above one-third of the atmosphere, as well as the absence of the lights of major cities, the summit of Haleakala is one of the most sought-after locations in the world for ground-based telescopes. As a result of the geographic importance of this observational platform, experts come from all over the world to take part in research at "Science City", an astrophysical complex operated by the U.S. Department of Defense, University of Hawaii, Smithsonian Institution, Air Force, Federal Aviation Agency, and others.

Some of the telescopes operated by the US Department of Defense are involved in researching man-made (e.g. spacecraft, monitoring satellites, rockets, and laser technology) rather than celestial objects. The program is in collaboration with defense contractors in the new Maui Research and Technology Park in Kihei.

Mees Observatory

 Mees
The Mees Solar Observatory is unique in that it has many instruments attached to a single equatorial spar. There are a variety of experiments including a white-light imager, imaging-vector-magnetograph (IVM), high-resolution spectrograph, imaging polarimeter and other visiting and facility instruments.

PAN-STARRS PS 1 and PS 2
Prototype telescope (PS1), is single-mirror prototype for Pan-STARRS on Haleakala The first complete Gigapixel Camera was installed in August 2007. It was commissioned In December 2008 for a 3.5 year series of tests and scientific studies under the aegis of the PS1 Scientific Consortium. Prototype telescope (PS2), will be constructed in the dome next to PS1.

LCO Faulkes Observatory

The Faulkes Telescope Project is the education arm of Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network (LCOGTN).
Its aim is to provide free access to robotic telescopes and a fully supported education programmer to encourage teachers and students to engage in research-based science education.

TLRS-4 Laser Ranging System

TLRS-4 at HO is to maintain the time-series of SLR data produced by LURE. This is critical to the investigation of the long period geophysical phenomena being studied. Further, the loss of the only SLR site in the Northern Pacific Ocean has degraded the accuracy of satellite orbits derived from the data produced by the worldwide system of SLR sites.

Zodiacal Light Observatory

The Zodiacal Light Observatory houses 2 instruments.

The SOLARC instrument is a 0.5m off-axis corona graphic reflecting telescope with a fiber-fed imaging spectropolarimeter. The telescope is used for a number of solar and coronal experiments.

The Day-Night Seeing Monitor (DNSM) optical seeing monitor system uses a differential image motion measurement (DIMM) technique to obtain seeing (R0) statistics. 

Advanced Electro-Optical System [AEOS]
The 3.67-meter AEOS telescope is the Air Force's largest and most advanced telescope system. This is a joint AFOSR-NSF initiative that focuses on making the AEOS telescope available for research and instrument development. The University of Hawai'i operates a high-resolution visible and infra-red spectrograph and spectropolarimeter facility instrument on this telescope. For more information click here.

Maui Space Surveillance Site

The Maui Space Surveillance Site (MSSS) includes the Air Force Maui Optical Station (AMOS) is an asset of the US Air Force Materiel Command's Phillips Laboratory. the Maui Optical Tracking and Identification Facility (MOTIF), and a Ground-based Electro-Optical Deep Space Surveillance (GEODSS) site operated by US Air Force Space Command.