The Andes Lidar Observatory (ALO) at Cerro Pachon, Chile, first light

The University of Illinois has completed the Andes Lidar Observatory (ALO) at Cerro Pachon, Chile (30.33 S;70.98 W, 2737 m). This facility will house a Na Wind/Temperature lidar, one of three such lidars supported by the NSF Consortium of Resonance and Rayleigh Lidar (CRRL) systems. Additionally, the facility contains airglow imagers and temperature mappers from Utah State University, an OH IR imager from The Aerospace Corporation, and airglow imagers and photometers as well as a meteor radar from the University of Illinois. The lidar has been upgraded to have 4 channels of receiver dedicated to make wind and temperature studies of the mesopause region, with a special configuration of receivers to measure vertical flux of horizontal momentum and heat. First light observations of atmospheric wave observations by lidar and airglow instrumentation are presented, where a mountainous wave source ‘hot spot’ has been previously reported.