Christian Saldías, Information Technology Manager, is ALMA’s first hire (lsm). Before the organization as such existed, already since 2003 and as a collaborator of the ESO, working for the project.
“The OSF consisted of three water ponds and a container with a hole to access the inside. That was the office (there were no bathrooms, no kitchen, no internet). We were building the base camp, which would later be replaced by what we know today as OSF.”
Since its inception, it has been responsible for allowing users to store, process and transport the information required by the project to carry out its mission.
“At that time, IP telephony was just coming out. At the suggestion of some colleagues in Europe, we said ‘since we don’t have anything, we can try something new’. We set ourselves the challenge of installing this new technology and we were the first observatory to have it, in the middle of the desert.”
Then came the task of installing a network for 5 computers and a communications link between the incipient observatory and ESO’s offices in Santiago.
“We talked to the internet provider and asked them to give us a 4 megabit network, and they almost fell on their backs because they had 8 megabits for all of San Pedro de Atacama. When we told them we would soon need 100 megabytes they asked us if we were crazy.”
Installing Fiber Optics between AOS and Calama
He tells us that for the first couple of years communication between the site and Santiago was limited to emails and phone calls.
As part of the team in charge of the construction and habilitation of the site, “which at that time did not exceed fifteen people”, Christian and his colleagues faced not only the precariousness of the facilities, but also the accesses.
“There was no road, it was a track that we had to avoid at times because it was in such bad condition that it was better to open a new track. That was at 3,000 msnsm, at 5,000 there was simply nothing. In fact, the first few times we climbed, we arrived through the back, through Pampa La Bola, because this way was a real odyssey.”
Christian began by defining the skills and services required and, project after project, grew as more people joined the challenge.
“From there, I have seen it grow into the fully functional unit it is today, providing valuable support to all the observatory’s activities.”
He considers ALMA to be the most important thing in his professional career and proudly sees the results of almost twenty years of service to the observatory.
“To be able to work in an organization like this is a privilege, not only because of its impressive goal or the technology to which one has access, but also because of the quality of its people. One has the opportunity to share experiences with people from all over the world. I can’t think of a better place where one can develop professionally and have a mission of greater importance than to learn about our origins.”
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