Facilities, Site & Infrastructure

 

 

The MRO Facilities, Site & Infrastructure Office is responsible for developing, installing and maintaining the infrastructure and facilities at the Observatory. This task includes maintaining the the access road, FSR235, to the Observatory. To date the office has been responsible for :

 

  • Reconstruction of 8.5 miles of Forest Road 235 which rises more than 4000 ft through the Cibola National Forest. Installed 72 new culverts and three wet crossings.

  • Construction of 20 miles of 3-phase 14.4 kV electrical power line from Magdalena town to the Ridge. This included over 12 miles of new pole line in addition to new conductors, switchgear, and fiber optic cable.

  • Construction 7800 feet of new utility trenches to provide power water and data communications to the new facilities on the ridge. 1200 feet of this trench was hand dug on a 60% grade.  The utility distribution trench required 20,000 cubic yards of excavation and 4,000 cubic yards of imported fill. It includes almost 40,000 feet of conduit and pipe.

  • Construction of a 96,000 gallon water tank with and adjacent 640 square foot pump house. The pump house includes electric booster and domestic water pumps in addition to a diesel fire water pump. The fire pump can provide 750 gallons of water per minute.

  • Almost 40,000 ft of conduit

  • Trucking over 350,000 gallons of water to the site for long-term storage as well as construction.

 

The Site and Infrastructure Office owns a John Deer 554J front loader, a 99 Kenworth water truck with a 3000 tank, a 100 gallon dodge fuel truck, a Volvo BL70 4x4 backhoe/loader, and a fleet of 7 four and two wheel drive vehicles. The fleet  includes two new 1-ton Silverado maintenance support trucks with a sander/spreader, generator, welder, compressor and other maintenance equipment. We are vying for the world’s highest fire hydrants having installed three hydrants between 10,460ft and 10,599ft.”

For more information, please contact:

Ifan Payne, Ph.D.
Project Manager, Site
Magdalena Ridge Observatory, New Mexico Tech
101 East Road, Socorro, NM 87801
(575) 835 - 6808, (575) 835-6807 FAX