FORS1 at Paranal at the end of the integration phase

The first FOcal Reducer/low dispersion Spectrograph (FORS1) was sent by plane to Santiago de Chile on July 4, 1998, well packed in 22 boxes. After a two-day trip on the Panamericana, it arrived at the base camp on Cerro Paranal in the afternoon of July 10. The FORS team from G��ttingen, Heidelberg and Munich (Germany) started unpacking and re-integration of instrument sections next day in the Auxiliary Telescope Hall . Functional tests of the integrated sections were performed during the following days with excellent results. In particular, the delicate Multi-Object Spectroscopy system worked perfectly. Then the test crew for special verification and alignment work took over; these activities were successfully finished on August 7. (Photo obtained on August 7, 1998).