Members of the public joins first Open Day for 2025 at Karoo Site

It was a happy occasion for the SARAO Communications and Stakeholder Relations team to welcome more than 60 members of the public to the first Public Open Day for the year on Wednesday, 2 July 2025.

The SARAO Public Open Day is aimed at allowing members of the public to visit the MeerKAT radio telescope and other instruments that are hosted on the Karoo site.

Gathering on a blustery cold winter morning at the SASSA Hall in Carnarvon, the visitors met with the team, supported by the SARAO Safety Health, Environment and Quality team, the Site Operations team and the Telescope Maintenance team, for the welcoming and to receive a safety induction and high visibility safety wear. The visitors were each given a small gift from SARAO.

The Northern Cape crafters also exhibited their handmade wares to the guests, who briskly engaged and purchased some of the unique goods before departing for site.

The guests, who came from the Northern Cape, Western Cape, Eastern Cape, Gauteng, Mozambique and Europe, were taken on the trip to site with the 90 kilometre stretch of road between the Klerefontein Support Base and the Karoo site. Upon arrival, the guests were treated to some refreshments before the tours commenced.

The group of visitors were divided into two groups with one group departing for the MeerKAT core, KAT-7, the Hydrogen Epoch of Reionisation Array, and other guests instruments on the Karoo site. The members of the second group started their day on a tour of Losberg, the Karoo Array Processing Building, the Dish Shed and surrounds. After each tour the other group would depart for the rest of the tour and vice versa. The visitors also had a photo opportunity at a predetermined location on site among the antennas.

The Losberg tours were conducted by Sizwe Seranyane, Telescope Maintenance Manager and Sonwabile Toto, Electrical Technician, while the MeerKAT core tours were conducted by Dr Anton Binneman, Science Engagement Manager, and Marion West, Science Engagement Coordinator.

The guests were elated to share the experience and gave some very good feedback. “Thank you for a wonderful and memorable experience, which my partner Leesha and I thoroughly enjoyed! It was good to meet you, and other SARAO staff who were there. The visit was very timeous for me, as I have recently written a piece on astronomy and mental wellbeing, which has been published in the publication,” said Marc Roffey from Cape Town, who is also a member of the Cape Centre of the Astronomical Society of Southern Africa.

Unnikrishnan Sureshkumar from Gauteng said: “Thank you so much for organizing the open day. I enjoyed it very much. I am curious to see the pictures, and I would love to use them in my upcoming MeerKAT related talks in conferences.”

Dates for the next SARAO Public Open Days will be announced in due course and widely advertised on SARAO’s website and social media platforms. We look forward to welcoming more members of the public to the Karoo site and advancing the public understanding of science through it.