Overview
- The anniversary was marked on Monday in Sutherland with SALT, the science ministry and the SAAO hosting dignitaries, scientists and international partners.
- Deputy Minister Nomalungelo Gina praised cross‑border collaboration, called the 1998 funding decision a turning point for science, and pledged continued leadership in astronomy.
- SALT remains the largest single optical telescope in the Southern Hemisphere, located on a dark plateau near Sutherland and designed to capture extremely faint light.
- The facility’s science record includes rapid optical follow‑up of a 2017 gravitational‑wave event, a 2022 finding in a low‑metallicity galaxy, and more than 600 publications since operations ramped up in 2011.
- Built by an international consortium led by South Africa’s NRF using an 11‑meter segmented mirror design adapted from the Hobby‑Eberly Telescope, SALT also funds a collateral benefits program and has grown local capacity through a largely South African workforce and dozens of doctoral theses.