Posted by Delver of Yore
Does the army still use observatories like that today?
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Absolutely the US military does, though in the case of the military, we're better off referring to them as tracking stations because
observatory kinda implies looking at stars & planets, whereas the military uses them for detection, tracking & monitoring of objects like US & foreign rockets/missiles, satellites, etc. using optical, electro-optical, radio frequency interferometry, and RADAR systems located at sites around the world.
Some sites, like the ones around White Sands Missile Range, Kennedy Space Center, Vandenberg AFB, Naval Base Ventura County (Pt Mugu -- look up Laguna Peak Tracking Station), etc. would mostly de used for tracking test launches from those sites, so that for example, if a rocket or missile blew-up 25 seconds after-launch, they could review video footage & telemetry recorded by the nearby electro-optical and telemetry monitoring stations to try to figure out what happened. More importantly, by observing the video footage in real-time from the launch control facility, they can determine of the rocket/missile is going off-course, and if-so, they can send a Destruct command to it so that it ideally blows-up over the restricted White Sands Missile Range area instead of crashing into some populated area.
About half-way down on this web page, it talks about the WSMR tracking systems:
https://www.wsmr.a...Pages/default.aspx This web page is about the more strategic detection & tracking systems:
https://en.wikiped...rveillance_Network My Vandenberg AFB Flickr page has some photos of the old Satellite Tracking Station, which I briefly UE'd a long time ago, and I think there are some distant photos showing their current Satellite Tracking facility.
https://www.flickr.../72157635581013942 If you click on an individual photo, you'll see there is a caption for it. Funny *well, not at the time..) story about me & that satellite tracking center -- back around 1990 while in California for a month for work in LA, I took a few days to head N & explore some military stuff (my UE specialty). I poked around Vandenberg Air Force Base. The installation is so large, there are many parts of it outside the actual secured, main installation, including numerous compounds, the security police pistol/rifle range, etc.& some of those roads have limited public right of way. So as I'm joy-riding, I observe a compound with what looks to be a white radome atop a hill in the distance (turned out to be the satellite tracking facility), so I did my best to head towards it, and eventually found what I was sure was the access road leading-up to it. It was a very narrow road, with the usual signs warning everyone to not
pass a tres... Sat there at the base of the access road, asking myself if I was a stupid man, or a smart mouse, and eventually, the stupid man part of me won-out, so I started driving up the access road, ignoring the signage and ignoring some pretty negative consequences if I got caught. Understand that I'm already on USAF property, in a car with lots of radios & radio antennas, a GPS, a 35mm camera with zoom lens & lots of film, etc. and absolutely zero excuse for being there, then on top of that, I'm driving up a road that leads to a sensitive, fenced compound passing numerous warning signs. If I got caught, they'd clearly think I was a spy. The road was somewhat steep, winding and narrow. I figured I'd get to the top, and just check the compound out from outside what would surely be a secured gate, hoping there'd be enough space up there for me to turn-around and then drive back down & get the heck out of there...
So I get to the top, and... the gate to site fenced compound is open! I don't see anyone, but clearly, the site is in use... As much of an idiot as I was for driving up there, the little sensibility I had told me that I was NOT going to drive past the gate into the compound. That would be pushing it too much, besides, I'd had some very close-calls driving or walking into a gated facility, only to learn the hard way that the gate was motorized/ Only luck prevented me from getting locked inside the fenced perimeter of a place & having to knock on the door & beg for mercy (except one time, at the old Willow Run Air Force Station in Michigan...). So I'm at the top of the hill, sitting in my car just outside the open-gate, trembling with both fear & excitement. The devil on my one shoulder is saying "
It's your lucky day! The gate is open & there doesn't seem to be anyone around! Drive on in & explore! You came all this way -- you can't just leave now" & the angel on my other shoulder is saying "You';re lucky top just get up here & get a quick look at the compound. Don't push your luck LEAVE NOW!" But then I notice there's no easy way to turn-around outside the gate (the photo showing the gate area is somewhat deceiving). If I wanted to GTFO, the easiest, fastest way would be for me to drive past the gate into the compound & turn-around in their parking lot & then drive out & down the access road.
So I take a deep breath, drive on into the 'controlled area' compound and just as I cross the threshold... Some USAF Sgt opens a door and walks outside. We see each other at the same time -- he looks surprised, and I would have looked shocked. I immediately stopped my car. Thankfully, instead of running back inside to alert security police, he walks-up to my car. I thought fast, and immediately started apologizing, stating I was driving around, looking for hilltops that could have a good view for the occasional Space Shuttle launches from Vandenberg - that's why I drove up that hill, and once I got to the top & saw the compound, I wanted to leave immediately because it then dawned on me that I shouldn't be there, but in order to get my car safely turned-around to leave, I had to enter their compound, and that's what was going-on when he walked out of the building & saw me. I was a clean-cut, conservative looking American, and thankfully (but somewhat surprisingly) he bought my story. He said I was very lucky that the security police hadn't caught me, or "There'd be a lot of paperwork to fill-out..." He also stated that to watch ant space shuttle launches from Vandenberg property, I'd need written permission from the base commander, etc. I thanked him, and got the hell out of there with my tail between my legs. I was still thinking he may have been planning on calling the base security police on me after I left, but I had the base security channels in my scanner and never heard anything related to me.
I was extremely lucky. This was long-before 9/11 and the whole "
If you see something, say something." It was also long-before Google Earth & most of the web existed, so if you wanted to satisfy basic curiosity, you had to explore & possibly take some risks...
So about 12 years later, I'm now living in Northern California, and decide to take a road-trip down South. I re-hit Vandenberg AFB, and no, I still hadn't gained any common-sense, so I decided to once again, check out that secure compound atop the hill or ridgeline! To my utter delight, it was obvious that while certainly still USAF property sitting on an active USAF base, the compound was now abandoned (a nice thing about most military facilities is that if the site is active, there's won't be weeds & trash lying around -- a 'signature'), so I drove on in, took some photos of the exterior, quickly poked around the inside of the site, then drove around looking at some old trailers & out-buildings behind the main building, before finally leaving & poking around other parts of the base.
Someone whom I can neither confirm nor deny might also be here on uer.ca also visited the same abandoned compound a while after I did:
https://www.flickr...7/with/3191782562/ Sorry to kind of hijack the thread! Anyone down around WSMR should definitely visit the museum there:
https://history.ar...teSands/index.html There are other old, abandoned tracking stations related to WSMR in the area, some still having some cool equipment left behind.
/-/oolie
I'm the exact same, I know the locations of a few of them, but this is the first one I could actually get to. Took a while but 100% worth it, what cool places! Good luck in your expeditions to them in the future! 
