Bird’s Eye Views: Extremely Large Telescope under Construction in Chile | ESO

Bird’s Eye Views: Extremely Large Telescope under Construction in Chile | ESO

A drone shot of European Southern Observatory’s Extremely Large Telescope's dome. The telescope’s massive dome will house the telescope and its sensitive components, protecting them from the extreme desert environment. During the night, its two sliding doors will open to allow observations of the night sky.

Drone image of the partially open ELT’s dome

Drone image of the ELT’s dome

This drone image, taken in April 2026, shows a stunning view above the dome of ESO’s Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), under construction atop Cerro Armazones, a mountain in Chile’s Atacama Desert. The sliding doors are partially open, showing the top of the telescope’s main structure inside. The catwalks running along the edges of the sliding doors convey the sheer size of the 80-m high dome.

This main structure of the ELT will host the telescope’s 5 mirrors, and is designed to keep the telescope stable under all conditions, including high winds during observations and earthquakes.

The dome’s two sliding doors are partially open, showing the catwalks running along their edges. It will house the telescope and its sensitive components, protecting them from the extreme desert environment.

The dome’s two sliding doors are partially open, showing the catwalks running along their edges. 

Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), glowing in the sunset light of the Chilean Atacama Desert and surrounded by massive cranes hard at work to get this telescope up and running. 

These photos, taken in April 2026, shows drone shots of the European Southern Observatory’s Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), under construction in Chile’s Atacama Desert. The telescope’s massive dome will house the telescope and its sensitive components, protecting them from the extreme desert environment. During the night, its two sliding doors will open to allow observations of the night sky. When these images were taken, the ELT is over 70% complete.

This soon-to-be telescope is located at the top of Cerro Armazones, the mountain that casts a triangular shadow in the background of this drone image. At 3046 meters above sea level, and with very dry conditions, the ELT is in the perfect location for astronomical observations under one of the most pristine skies on Earth. Its dome, planned to be fully completed in 2027, protects the telescope and its sensitive components from the extreme desert environment, and from the Sun during daytime. At night, its two massive sliding doors will open to allow the telescope to observe the night sky, while still protecting it from the wind.

Inside the dome, the construction of the main structure of what will be the world's largest optical and near-infrared telescope is very advanced. With the first light planned for the end of the decade, the ELT and its groundbreaking 39-meter main mirror will take on some of the biggest challenges in astronomy and, ultimately, help us understand our place in the Universe.

Learn more about the ELT: https://elt.eso.org

Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, extending along a narrow strip of land between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. 

Image Credit: ESO/G. Vecchia
Image Dates: April 23-27, 2026

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