National Solar Observatory, USPS office in Sunspot, NM evacuated for 'safety reasons'

Guys, this observatory is funded, operating, and if anything doing more than it used to. Look at the new twitter feed from sunspotsolarobs twitter feed. Its not going away.

Two new pieces from local news here in El Paso.
www.kvia.com...

LAS CRUCES, N.M. - New Mexico State University's director of the Sunspot Solar Observatory said the evacuation of the facility last week was "extremely calm."

"I picked up the phone, called our people, and asked them to lock up everything and leave quietly and sensibly," said Dr. James McAteer, who also teaches astronomy at NMSU. "It was extremely calm. They locked everything up and they left."

Last week, ABC-7 broke the news that the FBI evacuated the National Solar Observatory and the USPS office in Sunspot for "security reasons." New Mexico State has four employees at the observatory and the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) has around five employees, McAteer said.

"They are telecommuting," McAteer said. "There is plenty of work for them."

There are also two to three employees at the post office. The director told ABC-7 he was not told why they were to evacuate, but he doesn't believe it has anything to do with the telescope, used by NMSU astronomy students to research the sun.

"There is no issue with the telescope," McAteer said. "The telescope has never been better."

"I was surprised," said Dr. Jacson Jackiewicz, another professor at NMSU. "I was curious as to what might be happening. I still don't know and I hope it can reopen soon because we have projects going on up there, difference experiments that we're doing."​

Residents of nearby Cloudcroft, New Mexico, also had no idea what was going on this week.


However, Dr. McAteer said he welcomes the public's curiosity about the project.

"Public interest in science is always good," the director said. "I hope every single person in the state wants to go to Sunspot to visit after this. That would be amazing. It is a public resource. It's open to the public. It's paid for by the public."

And from www.kob.com...

SUNSPOT, NEW MEXICO – The mystery surrounding the evacuation of a small mountainous area in Southern New Mexico has led to a lot of conspiracy theories.

The Sunspot Solar Observatory is blocked by a line of caution tape. Officials with the observatory say they are investigating a security incident.

Local law enforcement said the FBI is the agency investigating, but they remain in the dark.

'Telescope did not see aliens,' but Sunspot mystery continues
“The FBI has not contacted us. We don't know what they took, what their reason for being there was. We have no information on it," said Sgt. Jon Emery of the Otero County Sheriff’s Office.

Residents who have been evacuated said they haven’t gotten many answers either.

“It is very frustrating being out of our home. I will say that and I can't wait until this is over," Sean Williams said.

He’s heard about the conspiracy theories flooding the internet.

“Boy, people come up with some outlandish stuff," he said. “An alien landed here."

However, James McAteer, a New Mexico State University professor who is also the director of the Sunspot Solar Observatory said the “telescope did not see aliens. All data will be made public in its unaltered form. Nothing is hidden or kept secret."

The FBI has not commented on the investigation.

Evacuees said they have not been told when they could possibly return home.

"My feeling is it’s going to be something stupid and small and minuscule when it’s all said and done but we will see,” Williams said.

Also, looks like one of the bad ass residents is now camping at the gate.

a reply to: SheilaD

Leave quietly and sensibly, everyone remained calm. That stinks to high hell.

Are we still going with the closing it down angle?

"I was surprised," said Dr. Jacson Jackiewicz, another professor at NMSU. "I was curious as to what might be happening. I still don't know and I hope it can reopen soon because we have projects going on up there, difference experiments that we're doing."​

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

But their grant money looks fine. Local news here is reporting they get NSF funding.

a reply to: SheilaD

You're allowing spin and rhetoric to blind your objectivity.

This is people making something look important so they can get more funding.

Just look at the Twitter feed about the "visitor center" (just another example).

Look deeper, and more carefully, and you will find out you are mistaken. I did.

You've got to wonder who is providing shelter resources for the evacuees and under who's authority.

I think it’ll stay watched by civilians. There’s more people showing up a reply to: CraftBuilder

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
a reply to: Mactaddy

Except for the fact that...we're at a Solar Maximum right now.

Are you sure about that?

Everything I see says we are getting close to a minimum?

NASA seems to think so... Solar Minimum is Coming

The sun is heading toward solar minimum now. Sunspot counts were relatively high in 2014, and now they are sliding toward a low point expected in 2019-2020.

a reply to: threeeyesopen

Yeah, you may not have, but it was a paraphrased quote and the word was absolutely ‘footage’.

We’re on our way to a minimum. Some alarming information that sounds looks credible but idk. Is that over the 11 year span the sun is running 6% colder overall. Global warming will still persist, however, after that we are suppose to be colder. They also said the sun will be a little darker as well. a reply to: Drunkenparrot

How could we find this out?

a reply to: CraftBuilder

a reply to: threeeyesopen

Pg. 68. Threeeyesopen quotes the article. I read it and respond. We both use the word footage. It’s been changed. Whether it was a simple error or not, regardless, it’s been changed.

a reply to: Fiscal

As a side note, on 4/pol/ an alleged worker at Sunspot is answering questions right now. Has provided some pretty acceptable proof towards identity and reasonable info.

TLDR: he doesn’t know anything. But some interesting details.

a reply to: PublishedShadow

Unsurprisingly, on most of the instruments, there’s no data for the dates of September 5th through September 10th. The oddest thing to me was the lack of SDO/AIA data. In the month of August, the AIA has 2000+ images per day. Then we have nothing for September 1st or 2nd. Then 2400 Images on the 3rd and 2025 on the 4th. Then no AIA data again until September 10th.

I went to SOHO/LASCO on the weekend, think Saturday, and could not get any of the mpeg movie histories to work. They are typically 24 hour and 3 day, along with "The Sun Now". Clicking on the icons just quit after the play screens came up. They seem to work ok now... but that was weird as well. I also heard that a number of commonly used webcams in the area went down as well, but I cannot substantiate that.

originally posted by: Fiscal
a reply to: Fiscal

As a side note, on 4/pol/ an alleged worker at Sunspot is answering questions right now. Has provided some pretty acceptable proof towards identity and reasonable info.

TLDR: he doesn’t know anything. But some interesting details.

Please post a link, I’m going to see if it’s a guy I talked to. He went private after I asked him some #. I feel paranoid but I think he was actor

a reply to: CraftBuilder

That's an interesting angle, does anyone know where the people were "evacuated" to? I was under the impression they havent been allowed to return home, which would be on campus? Im guessing...if not they wluld have to be sheltered somewhere unless they are being allowed to stay with orher family. They did mention they've been "telecommuting" so maybe thats where they are..if not it would be interesting to find out who is funding their stays if elsewhere

a reply to: Plzbetrue

I PM’d it. /pol/ threads can be NSFL. Wouldn’t want to link it publicly.

a reply to: itswhatev

They were never there, 3-4 are in Texas and 5 In NSO. Remote access. They have ran a skeleton crew before the facility gets moved.

a reply to: Plzbetrue

No offence at ALL, i dont mean this to come across as an attack but you sound paranoid and also a bit manic. It may just be because of how I'm reading your writing style, but if your thoughts are running a mile a minute maybe you should either take a bit of a break from this story and clear your head, try and get some sleep, etc. Again, no offence

a reply to: Fiscal

The bottom of the article says it was edited/updated 4 hours ago.
I have the cached page that reads "footage",
so yeah I believe ya

a reply to: Plzbetrue

If they were never there- then who was "evacuated" without a timeframe in which they'd be allowed to return home? Im sure some employees were telecommuting prior to this, but that's literally what started this whole situation is it not?