Wildfire Threatens Historic Observatory

La Canada/Flintridge, California
2:03 a.m. August 31, 2009

The Station Fire, which originated near the Clear Creek Fire Station in the Angeles National Forest on Wednesday, August 26, has now spread to encompass an area over 160 miles in circumference. Burning furiously out of control, in all directions, Mt. Wilson Observatory and the telecommunications towers which serve most of the greater southern California are in immediate danger as flames approach from three flanks of the fire.

Firefighters from the Calavaras County Fire Department are on sight at the historic Mt. Wilson Observatory, where they are joined by at least two civilians; Larry Webster, Site Manager fro the Georgia State University’s CHARA (Center for High Angular Resolution Astronomy) Program, and Mt. Wilson Superintendent David Jurasevich.

The communications array at Mt. Wilson includes transmission towers for twenty two television stations as well as most of the FM radio broadcast stations in the Los Angeles area. Situated in extremely steep terrain and twenty miles by two lane mountain highway from the neighboring city of La Canada Flintridge, Mt. Wilson is nestled in the heart of the Angeles National Forest. The bulk of the efforts to contain the fire have been at the base of the cities which surround the forest; La Canada, La Crescenta, Pasadena, Alta Dena and Glendale, where multi-million dollar homes abut the forest.

Webster and Jurasevich remained at the Mt. Wilson facility after astronomers, physicists and residents were evacuated to protect the homes, historic buildings and telescopes, and state of the art astronomical laboratory that sits atop the tree-studded mountain.

Mt. Wilson’s history and value to the scientific community have not been addressed by the media as firefighters struggle to save homes and neighborhoods. Only in the late evening of August 29 was the threat to communications networks, including emergency services, addressed.
Larry Webster and David Jurasevich are determined to save the other valuable assets on the mountain, such as the 100” Hooker Telescope, built in 1917 by George Ellery Hale. Still in perfect functioning condition today, this state of the art instrument was the largest telescope in the world for half a century. It is the instrument astronomer Edwin Hubbell used to discover that our universe is expanding, and where the “Big Bang” theory for the creation of our universe originated.

Albert Einstein met with Hubbell at Mt. Wilson to discuss theories such as the possibility of the expanding universe, which he had predicted, but did not believe in. To counteract that prediction Einstein developed the theory of the “cosmological constant”. Once Hubbell and others were able to convince Einstein that an expanding universe was real, Einstein called his cosmological constant theory the “greatest blunder” of his career.
Mt. Wilson is a working observatory; a community of astronomers live in residences on the mountain and others stay for extended periods in the historic “monastery” building or in guest cabins which dot the mountain top, tucked between telescopes and observation towers. Intense training seminars for astronomy students are held throughout the summer months.

The Carnegie 60” telescope is used regularly throughout the year by students, astronomers, scientists and the public to observe the universe. The solar towers at Mt. Wilson have been used continuously every sunny day since 1912 to observe our sun, and much of what we understand about our star has come from observations at Mt. Wilson.

Webster has spent the better part of his career on Mt. Wilson. His knowledge of the property and its equipment is expansive and intimate; he has worked on every major telescope on the property since the mid-1970s.

Jurasevich, also an amateur astronomer, recently discovered a previously unknown and highly unusual object in the sky, called the “Soap Bubble Nebula” in 2007 from a telescope at Mt. Wilson.

The Observatory is a popular destination for visitors, including a museum, two visitor’s galleries, a food court set to open in October, and miles of walking and hiking trails easily accessible from the summit. The private library of Mt. Wilson includes documents, books, star charts and collections of astronomical data dating from the mid-1800s, including rare and unique bodies of work.

All of this is in danger of burning as flames make their way up the steep ridges in the wee hours of Monday morning. Despite its history, its scientific relevance in the present day, and the presence of the communications towers so vital to southern California, firefighting resources have been stretched thin and saving suburban residences has taken priority over the preservation of historic Mt. Wilson.

Webster and Jurasevich will be making a stand against the fire not to save the communications towers, but to save the Observatory.
In a recent docent training seminar Jurasevich expressed his sentiments about the mountain to the trainees. “This observatory holds more history and great moments in science than any other location in the world. It is still being used every day of the year and we are still making discoveries here. We want to preserve this place for the generations to come and still be open to the public a hundred years from now.”