It was the cyberattack suffered on Saturday, October 29, 2022, and Bill Dent, our System Astronomer, was a first-row witness to this unforgettable event for the observatory, one of several milestones in which he has been present.
From the same office where he’s worked for more than a decade, Bill recalls that he originally only came for three years: “That’s what I told my wife. So yeah, my kids basically grew up here. They went to school here and spent most of their lives in Chile. I came for three years and stayed for 15.”
The adventures soon followed. Only a year after arriving in Chile from Scotland, he would experience the 2010 earthquake.
“I remember going to the director’s office, and there was someone else producing early bits of data. The first ring was starting to appear in the noise, and I was like, ‘it can’t be real’. And then we got a bit more data, and it’s getting deeper and deeper, and you can see it’s coming out. That was really cool, really exciting,” Bill recounts, as he recalls the unveiling of the HL Tau image in 2014.
He also recalls the excitement of watching his colleagues obtain the first image of a black hole in 2019.
Before leaving, he describes his years of adventure at ALMA with his characteristic humor: “If you only have one opportunity to do something and you don’t take it, you miss it. So it’s been great, even though my language skills are crap. It’s amazing how far you can go without mastering the language. People are pretty tolerant if you at least try, right?”.
We thank Chin-Shin Chang, Sergio Martin, Yoshiharu Asaki, Laura Gómez and Hugo Messias for the photos.
Goodbye, Bill, and thanks for all the fish!
Amazing scientist and person. ALMA is forever grateful to Bill.
Bill – our professional lives have been intertwined for 34 years. long will our friendship continue. Thanks for all that you have contributed to ALMA’s success, and sharing your expertise with all of us.