Warkworth Radio Astronomical Observatory
The Warkworth Radio Astronomical Observatory is located just south of Warkworth, New Zealand, off State Highway 1, about 50 km north of Auckland. It is operated by the Institute for Radio Astronomy and Space Research, Auckland University of Technology. The WARK12M 12m Radio Telescope was constructed in 2008. In 2010, a licence to operate the New Zealand Telecom 30m dish was granted, which led to the construction of the WARK30M 30m Radio Telescope. First observations with the Australian Long Baseline Array took place in 2011.
A Hydrogen maser is installed on-site for very accurate time required by VLBI observations. The observatory has a 10Gbit/s connection to the REANNZ network Research and Education Advanced Network New Zealand, providing high speed data transfers for files and e-VLBI as well as linking the site to the world wide NREN global architecture.
