September 29, 2017

Hello from LaserSETI headquarters!  Thanks to your generous support, we’ve made great progress and we’re excited to share what’s been happening.
 
The shipping and receiving department has been very busy.  Our fabulous custom crystals have arrived, and the shirts and hoodies should be in soon!  We’re still ahead of schedule on getting your perks out, and we’ll let you know when they start shipping out.
 
The camera systems themselves have also had a lot of deliveries.  We can’t wait to start working with the second camera, which will be arriving at the SETI Institute on Monday.  The transmission gratings are being manufactured, the computer to run the cameras has come in, as well as most of the components of the electrical, environmental, and site services subsystems.  In numbers, we’ve spent close to $50k thus far, have 21 components in hand, 5 on order or in transit, 3 ready to order, and 7 waiting on test results or TBD.  This is exactly where we were hoping to be at this point, we’re very excited about the modular enclosure design, and hopefully by the next update we’ll have some pictures to show the pieces coming together!
 
Cameras are, of course, no good unless you have somewhere to put them, and we were thrilled to have a very positive response and walkthrough at our first-choice observatory!  We can’t announce where that is yet, but site requirements have been established, met, and already exceeded in some cases, and the paperwork is underway. When it’s official, you’ll be the first to know.
 
In summary, the project and perks are off to a great start.  We’re very glad to have you all aboard, and we hope you’re enjoying this as much as we are!

Thank you for believing in Laser SETI and helping to make it happen – we couldn’t do it without you!