"A year ago, I would have been pessimistic about building the Thirty Meter Telescope on Mauna Kea,” says John O’Meara, deputy director and chief scientist for the W. M. Keck Observatory, one of 13 observatories on Mauna Kea, the Northern Hemisphere’s premier site for optical and IR astronomy. Opposition to the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) has long been strong, and in 2019, hundreds of Native Hawaiians and others blocked the road to prevent its construction on the mountain. (See “Thirty Meter Telescope faces continued opposition in Hawaii,” Physics Today online, 5 August 2019.)
But changes in the TMT leadership and in its approach to interactions with Native Hawaiians, as well as a new governance structure for Mauna Kea, may open the door to more fruitful dialog. O’Meara, who is not involved in the TMT, says recent developments make him “optimistic about astronomy on Mauna Kea, whether or not...
