It looks like a UFO, and its pilots seem to lose control and land in the mountains of Puerto Rico. This is an object of terrestrial origin, but it studies other planets. It is Arecibo Observatory.

Once, a mudslide left a huge and ugly crater on the northern coast of Puerto Rico. A professor at Cornell University found this natural formation suitable for a large scientific center. In 1963, the world-famous Arecibo Observatory was built.

The size of this giant is impressive! The “saucer” occupies 20 acres. It hangs on thick wisps on a height of a 50-story building. This is an incredible mix of a wild Puerto Rican nature, high mountains, dense forests, human inventions, and technological progress.

The observatory is unique! It can catch the tiniest radio waves from other planets and galaxies. You look at the mirror surface of the huge construction and believe that extraterrestrial intelligence exists. By the way, a saucer is used for such research. 

The telescope catches radio waves, named “music of the stars” by scientists. Here, they examined the Mercury planet. In this very observatory, they found out that the rotation speed of Mercury is 59 days instead of 88, as people thought earlier. Scientists working in Arecibo are very good at it. Some of them are Nobel Prize winners.

Coming here, you feel the future. Every detail can amaze. You cannot just study space, but also learn to do it. There is a unique exhibition hall with all the best achievements of the world's leading radar. You can visit modern audiences for 100,000 people. In these halls, scientific lectures, seminars, conferences in astrology, physics, mathematics, and technology take place. The professors can also take courses to pass on their knowledge to students.