Yesterday, we received a notice from the Superintendent of McDonald Observatory that a "telescope activity cessation order" had been issued by the University of Texas. Just a few hours ago, we received a notice from the Head of Telescope Operations of the South African Astronomical Observatory that they will be "shutting down operations at Sutherland" on March 26. At both of these sites, personnel will not be available to provide support until operations resume. In response to these notices, LCO's operations and engineering teams convened a meeting this morning and decided to suspend observations from these sites. We are in the process of shutting down our instruments.
The LCO network continues to operate at Siding Spring Observatory (COJ) in the south and at Wise Observatory (TLV), Teide Observatory (TFN) and Haleakala Observatory (OGG) in the north.
