Thieves steal another telescope at Mt. Lofty Adelaide.

[Malcolm]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-02-24/mount-lofty-telescope-stolen/7197094

[astroron]

Low life scum. :sadeyes:
Cheers

[yoda776]

Seriously, I don't know why people have to do this. there are more honest ways to earn money than stealing like this. Not good for tourism and hopefully they are insured.

[casstony]

I see theyre being forced to get security cameras to prevent future theft. Just looking into that myself and the digital cams aren't cheap.

[Somnium]

not sure to what end this was done. i am sure you would find it difficult to sell it for a reasonable price ...

[jenchris]

They're often not remarkable optics. And totally unsaleable due to obvious provenance.

[louie_the_fly]

Unfortunately, being fairly secluded, you get some right dero's up at Mt Lofty after the park has closed and the restaurant staff have gone home.

[tlgerdes]

Except they are binoculars not a telescope.

[deanm]

"$8000"?

Must have bought it locally...!!

Dean

[janoskiss]

You leave something like that out there for long enough someone will eventually steal it, it's as simple as that. I mean with 350,000 people visiting the site each year, they expect not one of them will cease [i mean seize :P] the opportunity!? They obviously haven't learnt their lesson after the first binoscope was stolen.

Anyway, they were clearly coin operated scopes so they've probably more than broken even if really that many people go up there and even just 1% of them use it. And that's probably why they did not bother to make more effort to better secure them.

[Matthew Lovell]

Actually, they were bought locally, although it was $8000 for the both.

[Fox]

It's sad to see how some people get their pleasure, I have no time for such thoughtless minds... Fox

[deanm]

"...they were bought locally, although it was $8000 for the both".

Wow! Thanks for the insider info: that's $2000 per OTA...!

What a rip-off! (You can pick up a new 11" Celestron SCT OTA for less).

Were they sourced from you, Matt?

Dean

[Somnium]

it is all about the ruggedness of the design, you couldn't allow the public to use a celestron on a daily basis. i am sure they had to be custom made

[bigjoe]

Hi Stewart

Love that word "dero". They'll probably get caught though- perving at all the local "sheilas" with them no doubt!

bigjoe

[jenchris]

Since they were on a very solid arm, I'm thinking that they are heavy.
Totally useless for normal use.
They will get junked for the front lenses so the kids can fry ants or something