His present is in Chile, but his memory takes him to the United States. Specifically, to Socorro, New Mexico. It was there that Héctor Alarcón‘s relationship with ALMA began 15 years ago.
There he was testing the antenna prototypes at the Atacama Test Facility (ATF), and when he returned to Chile he witnessed the first steps of the observatory: “When we returned there was still not much infrastructure. We worked in the Vertex hangar to verify the antennas and take advantage of the opportunity to train in the operation”, recalls our Array Operator Deputy Manager, from the Science Department.
From those beginnings there are great memories, especially with his co-workers: “I shared the house with Emilio Barrios, who until now is my boss. That time allowed me to get to know him as a person and helped us to have a very relaxed and trusting work environment,” says Héctor.
He also remembers the day of ALMA’s inauguration: “I remember the atmosphere. We were in the control room, super worried about moving the antennas at the right time”, he says.
Click here to watch the video of that moment.
Héctor also recalls other key milestones such as the arrival of the pandemic, which he lived in San Pedro: “Those were very important times professionally, but also personally. It was difficult at first to work from home, considering that whenever I was there, it was always family time,” he says.
And more recently, he was marked by the cyber-attack we suffered at the end of last year. “It was a challenge as a group to operate under those circumstances. We got to go to OSF and remember the shifts I did there, seeing colleagues was nice. It’s good to know that we left good memories,” he maintains.
It has been more than a decade since he joined the observatory and in the course of that time he has lived in San Pedro, raised his children and started a family.
An evolution that he has also seen in our organization: “ALMA has changed, especially in the way it treats human resources. The evolution towards caring for the person, having the values and vision of the observatory is something that I can’t fail to highlight”, Héctor concludes.
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Grande Héctor!!! Gran relato y cuántas experiencias en estos años!! Que sean muchos más, llenos de descubrimientos!!