Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope at 2,163 m (7,100 ft).

Research observatory · Cerro Tololo, Coquimbo Region, Chile

Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope

Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope (LCO) is a research observatory in Cerro Tololo, Coquimbo Region, Chile. Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope sits inside Gabriela Mistral Dark Sky Sanctuary, a Bortle Class 2 dark sky place.

Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope in brief

Open to the public
No regular public access
Elevation
2,163 m (7,100 ft)
Bortle class
Not yet rated
Part of
CTIO Observatory
Operated by
LCO

Official site

Can you visit Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope? No regular public access

Research telescope; CTIO free public tours Saturdays 9 am and 1 pm, reserve 24 h ahead.

For telescope views near Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope, see the observatories open to the public and astronomy clubs nearby; clubs hold free public star parties.

Telescopes at Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope

3 x 1m robotic.

Global network

CTIO Observatory: 12 observatories on one site

How dark the sky is at Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope

Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope has no Bortle rating in the list yet. The scale below shows what each class looks like.

1 mag 8.0 21.99+ 2 mag 7.5 21.89+ 3 mag 7.0 21.69+ 4 mag 6.5 20.49+ 5 mag 6.0 19.50+ 6 mag 5.5 18.94+ 7 mag 5.0 18.38+ 8 mag 4.5 18.00+ 9 mag 4.0
The Bortle scale. Each panel shows the class number, the faintest star the naked eye reaches at the zenith, and the darkest-edge sky brightness reading of that class in mag/arcsec².

Sky brightness and class come from the World Atlas of Artificial Night Sky Brightness (Falchi et al. 2016, CC BY-NC 4.0), with natural skyglow added, at the coordinates below. Research telescopes are often sited on mountains above the haze, so the real sky can be darker than the map suggests.

Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope among the observatories of Chile

Alto Loa National Reserve Bosque Fray Jorge National Park Gabriela Mistral Dark Sky Sanctuary Mano del Desierto Río Hurtado Rolf Chini Cerro Murphy Observatory Extremely Large Telescope Llano de Chajnantor Observatory SOAR Telescope (Southern Astrophysical Research) Giant Magellan Telescope CTAO South (Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory South) MASCARA-South BlackGEM Array MPG/ESO 2.2m Telescope Rapid Eye Mount Telescope Swiss Euler Telescope TAROT-South TRAPPIST Telescope VISTA Survey Telescope VLT Survey Telescope Next-Generation Transit Survey UCN 84 Telescope IRIS Telescope Victor M. Blanco 4m Telescope SARA South Telescope CHASE Telescope PROMPT Telescope GONG Telescope Wisconsin H-Alpha Mapper Atacama Pathfinder Experiment Atacama Submillimeter Telescope Experiment NANTEN2 Observatory University of Tokyo Atacama Observatory Huan Tran Telescope (HTT) All Sky Automated Survey HAT-South BiSON Deep Sky Chile Fred Young Submillimeter Telescope Simons Observatory ExTrA Danish 1.54m Telescope SPECULOOS-South VLT Auxiliary Telescopes KMTNet-CTIO HATPI CLASS Telescopes Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory ESO 3.6m Telescope Gemini South Observatory La Silla Observatory Las Campanas Observatory New Technology Telescope Paranal Observatory Very Large Telescope Vera C. Rubin Observatory SMARTS Telescopes Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array Du Pont Telescope Swope Telescope Warsaw Telescope Magellan Telescopes Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Cerro Tololo, Coquimbo Region, Chile Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Cerro Tololo, Coquimbo Region, Chile
Dark sky place Research or private observatory Observatory open to the public

Green dots are observatories open to the public, blue dots research or private sites, squares dark sky places; select one for its page. See Observatories in Chile for the full list.

The coordinates on this page point to LCO Stellan-A 1m dome, Cerro Tololo (CTIO geodetic list): 30.167°S, 70.805°W.

Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors. Open the larger map · Directions. Mountain observatory roads are often gated after dark; go only on a scheduled public night.

Dark sky places, observatories and clubs near Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope

Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope sits inside Gabriela Mistral Dark Sky Sanctuary, a Bortle Class 2 dark sky place. See Gabriela Mistral Dark Sky Sanctuary for camping, where to set up and the sky by season.

Nearest dark sky places

PlaceWhereBortleDistance
Gabriela Mistral Dark Sky SanctuaryVicuna, Chile21 km (1 mi)
Río HurtadoPichasca, Chile228 km (17 mi)
Bosque Fray Jorge National ParkOvalle, Chile2101 km (63 mi)

Other observatories open to the public within 150 km

  • Cerro Tololo Inter-American ObservatoryCerro Tololo, Coquimbo Region, Chile, 0 km (0 mi). Occasional public visits via NOIRLab programs; check site
  • SMARTS TelescopesVicuna, Coquimbo Region, Chile, 0 km (0 mi). Free Saturday daytime tours of Cerro Tololo by reservation through NOIRLab/CTIO
  • Vera C. Rubin ObservatoryVicuna, Coquimbo Region, Chile, 10 km (6 mi). Public visits to Cerro Pachon by reservation through NOIRLab; spaces fill quickly
  • Gemini South ObservatoryCerro Pachon, Coquimbo Region, Chile, 10 km (7 mi). Occasional organized visits via NOIRLab; no regular public night program
  • ESO 3.6m TelescopeLa Silla, Coquimbo Region, Chile, 101 km (63 mi). Part of ESO La Silla public visits (Saturdays; book ahead)
  • New Technology TelescopeLa Silla, Coquimbo Region, Chile, 101 km (63 mi). Part of ESO La Silla public visits

Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope record

Every value in the observatories dataset for Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope
ID665
NameLas Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope
AcroynmLCO
CityCerro Tololo
StateCoquimbo Region
CountryChile
ContinentSouth America
Webhttps://lco.global/
Publicn
Telescope3 x 1m robotic
ComplexCTIO Observatory
ParentLCO
Elevation2163
NotesGlobal network
Lat-30.1673
Lon-70.80479
LatLonSpotLCO Stellan-A 1m dome, Cerro Tololo (CTIO geodetic list)
StatusActive
StatusNoteLCO 1m node at CTIO
PublicNoteResearch telescope; CTIO free public tours Saturdays 9 am and 1 pm, reserve 24 h ahead
Sourceshttps://www.ctio.noirlab.edu/noao/content/Coordinates-Observatories-Cerro-Tololo-and-Cerro-Pachon; https://noirlab.edu/public/visits/cerro-tololo-chile
GlobalParkID66
ParkKm1.0

From the site's observatories dataset (observatoriesglobal_q426). Distances are computed from the coordinates.