Canada Is Building a Surveillance Network in Space | The Walrus

"Our iron giant is a deep space radio telescope, with an antenna dish measuring forty-six metres across, the largest instrument of its kind in Canada. Starting in the 1960s, the Algonquin Radio Observatory performed a number of cutting-edge scientific projects, including joining SETI's early efforts, in the 1970s and 1980s, to find signatures of alien life-spectrum emissions from water molecules, artificial transmitter signals. No luck."

"To pursue more experimental and commercially ambitious projects, he co-founded Thoth Technology in 2001 and later spun off an affiliate, ThothX. Thoth, Quine reminded me, was an Egyptian deity of wisdom. X? Elon Musk, of course. Musk has built his rocket enterprise, Space X, and his social media company, ex-Twitter, now X, into world-leading enterprises. Quine has similar ambitions-what he half-jokingly calls his "world domination plan.""

"Then the ARO fell on hard times-budget cutbacks, advances in telescope technology, aged and failing equipment. Canada's iron giant was mothballed by its operator, the National Research Council, in 1987. There it sat, silent, rusting, for two decades. But first he had to resurrect the iron giant. He fixed the broken windows of the control station, installed new electronics, and secured the perimeter against bears. Then he had to give the instrument a new purpose."

A forty-six-metre deep-space radio telescope at the Algonquin Radio Observatory conducted cutting-edge work from the 1960s, including SETI searches for water-molecule emissions and artificial transmitter signals. Budget cuts, technological advances, and equipment aging led the National Research Council to mothball the telescope in 1987, leaving it unused for two decades. Brendan Quine leased the facility in 2007, repaired infrastructure, modernized electronics, and secured the site. Quine founded Thoth Technology and ThothX to pursue experimental and commercial space projects and repurposed the instrument to confront contemporary concerns about geopolitical tension and reliance on space platforms.

Read at The Walrus