2018 January: SPIRou atop Maunakea

After one month of travel around the world, the 13 SPIRou crates are being delivered to the CFHT Telescope, atop Maunakea.

After leaving Toulouse, the crates went through Paris (France), Philadelphia (Pennsylvania, USA), before reaching Louisville (Kentucky) where they stayed for two weeks, waiting for available flights to pursue their migration. From Jan 23 onward, the crates resumed their trip, going through Ontario (California), Honolulu (Hawaii), reaching Kona on the Big Island and finally CFHT atop Maunakea, following the mandatory agricultural inspection. The crates were delivered in small loads of 2 to 4 crates arriving at CFHT in a random order on successive days – with the last load expected for Jan 30, about 2 weeks later than initially planned.  The shipping operation was handled by Ulisse, a CNRS entity specializing in shipping scientific instruments across the word, with help from IRAP / OMP and CFHT on both sides of the trip. 

A large SPIRou team from IRAP / OMP, NRC-H and CFHT is currently present at the summit to unload the crates from the truck into the telescope as they arrive, and transfer their content to the third CFHT floor where the SPIRou spectrograph will be installed.  Integration of the components delivered to date has already started under the supervision of Driss Kouach (SPIRou PM), Marielle Lacombe (dPM), Sébastien Baratchart (SE), Nicolas Striebig (AIT) and Greg Barrick (CFHT LPM).  The team is making its very best to compensate for the late arrival of the crates and the suboptimal order in which they were delivered, and catch-up on the original SPIRou re-assembly schedule. 

Stay tuned for forthcoming news as SPIRou is integrated and brought back to life in its new home!