Once a dish at the Australia Telescope Compact Array reaches its observing position, it plugs into the nearest station post for power and data. In the facility’s 2019–20 annual report, those connections had become a maintenance problem: after thirty years, the electrics needed attention, and water had entered several stations. [1]

The array stands outside Narrabri in New South Wales. Five of its six dishes can travel along railway tracks, but they do not roll about while collecting observations. CSIRO describes the moves between observing sessions at four kilometres an hour. Signals from the six antennas are combined to make a high-resolution radio image. [2]

A crane beside a partly assembled radio dish, with parallel rails and more dishes extending into the distance.
Railway tracks run beneath the partly assembled dishes in this archival construction view. “Close-up of Australia Telescope Compact Array Construction” — CSIRO, CC BY 3.0.Photo: CSIRO · Source · CC BY 3.0 · Resized, converted to sRGB and recompressed; no crop or retouching.

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Australia Telescope Compact Array, Narrabri. This map locates the town or region, not a verified exact historic event site.

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The repairs followed the tracks. By the time of the 2019–20 report, the north–south station posts had been overhauled, while work on the east–west line was underway. [1]

Inside the control building, another electrical job served the equipment receiving those observations. Workers replaced the switchboard and installed a second uninterruptible power supply. The report says this reduced the chance of a power failure in the screened room containing the correlator and timing equipment. [1]