Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex

35.426666666667 - 116.89Koordinaten: 35 ° 25 ' 36 "N, 116 ° 53' 24 " W

The Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex ( GDSCC ), also called the Goldstone Observatory, is an antenna system in the Mojave Desert in Southern California, USA, 60 kilometers north of Barstow.

The antenna system is part of the Deep Space Network (DSN ), a global network of radio antennas, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory operates for NASA to communicate with space probes and satellites, as well as radio and radar astronomy research purposes. Two other plants are the Madrid Deep Space Communications Complex in Spain and the Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex in Australia.

The first parabolic antenna in Goldstone was commissioned in 1966 and was the first of the DSN. Your parabolic mirror was in the late 1980s increased from 64 to 70 meters in diameter, to ensure better reception of data from the Voyager 2 spacecraft during its passage of the outermost planet Neptune. Beginning of the 1990s, the Goldstone Observatory was also used for the search program SETI. The end of 2010 took the plant after extensive refurbishment, with the 3200 -ton antenna had to be raised again to normal operation on.