The DAGOR Project


	*The DAGOR Project*


	Abstract: Concluding that the search and follow up of NEOs is a natural continuation of the previous work at Višnjan Observatory we started the DAGOR project. The intention is to set up a 1m f/3 telescope operative in the next few years.

After the last few evidences that the probability of a collision of Earth with a small body of the Solar system is not possible to neglect, we can see a growth of public interest for that topic and few national, international, political, academic, military, industrial and private initiatives to find and avoid those possible collisions.

Accepting that the first and most important job of a prevention system is a complete catalogue of asteroids and comets, and the extracted list of possible impactors, at the Visnjan Observatory we started an initiative for an upgrade of the existing astrometric telescope. We hoped that the telescope could be an instrument for follow up support for the newly discovered NEO-s.

After the first steps we sow the impossibility to bring the existing telescope to the needed level of automatization. We have also experienced the new wave of light pollution in the vicinity of the observatory.


	Fig. 1(left). Space photo of the light pollution of the north Adriatic region, with the site for the DAGOR telescope, on the east, less polluted coast.


	Fig. 2(right). The location of the DAGOR telescope in the inland of the Istria peninsula, on the map of Croatia.

As the Visnjan observatory is located in the urban area, the last years growth of the populated area and especially the growth due to the tourist activities on the coast of the Adriatic sea, the existing site is becoming completely unusable for that topic. These is clearly visible on the last years photos of the EN #77 European Network fireball station situated on the roof of the Visnjan Observatory main building.

With the help of the Region of Istria and the Croatian Ministry o Sciences, the Visnjan Observatory started a project DAGOR, a remotely operated observing point of the Visnjan Observatory.

The new, site would be dedicated to the astrometric and astrophysics observations of the small bodies of the solar system.

In the next few years we hope to have an operative 1.00 m telescope on the top of the Tièan site (hill on the west border of the Istria peninsula highlands). The telescope that would be heavily modified is the former OAT telescope of the Trieste Observatory, closed tube, 1.00m f / 3.0 primary focus.


	Fig. 3: The primary mirror of the DAGOR 1.00m telescope.

The telescope would be pointed with computer controlled brushless motors/brakes. The complete focal unit with coma corrector will be remade and CCD camera will be mounted in the telescope prime focus.

In the meantime of building the observatory and telescope in a new site, a series of tests of pointing electronics, primary focal plane coma corrector and a BI SITe CCD camera 1K x 1K, 24micron pixel and data handling would be done on the existing telescope of the Višnjan Observatory.


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