Message posted by John on January 20, 2011 at 12:24:57 PST:
Hello! I just wanted to speculate a bit on the satellite ground stations (the big moving satellite dishes) that were mentioned a bit with the latest panoramas of Area 51. The one facing the camera looks a lot like a Scientific Atlanta I was working near, though it could certainly be much bigger. http://img821.imageshack.us/img821/7681/scientificatlanta.jpg If you look at the google map location of that reflector, you can get a sense of scale and then cross-compare with the one at Area 51 (which I don't have time to do right now, but it might be fun!). http://goo.gl/jTOoW (the scientific atlanta is in the very middle, pointed to the north). In addition, it was mentioned in the little writeup that the dish would seemingly point in a single direction for a long period of time, even though no aircraft were present. From my experience working with satellite ground stations, this suggests that it is actually pointed at a geosynchronous satellite low on the horizon. When the dish returns to point straight up, that is simply the "birdbath" or "stow" position, as it is usually called. If anyone else can speculate on what brand of ground stations those are, that would be cool!
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