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Table Mountain Observatory

1924 establishments in CaliforniaAngeles National ForestAstronomical observatories in CaliforniaBuildings and structures in San Bernardino County, CaliforniaCalifornia Institute of Technology buildings and structures
Jet Propulsion LaboratoryMinor-planet discovering observatoriesNASA facilitiesNatural history of San Bernardino County, CaliforniaSan Gabriel MountainsUse American English from July 2025Wrightwood, California
Table Mountain Observatory 2
Table Mountain Observatory 2

Table Mountain Observatory (TMO) is an astronomical observation facility operated by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (California Institute of Technology). It is located in Big Pines, California, in the Angeles National Forest near Wrightwood, north-northeast of Los Angeles, California. TMO is part of JPL's Table Mountain Facility (TMF). The larger site hosts a number of non-astronomical projects. The site was first used by the Smithsonian Institution in 1924, which conducted atmospheric, solar, and astronomical observations for many years. JPL took over the lease in 1962. The observatory conducts high-precision astrometric observations to support NASA and international spacecraft mission navigation, confirmation and recovery of near-Earth objects such as comets and asteroids that may potentially impact the Earth, and technology development. The main-belt asteroid 84882 Table Mountain was named in honor of the observatory.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Table Mountain Observatory (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Table Mountain Observatory
Table Mountain Road,

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Latitude Longitude
N 34.382 ° E -117.6818 °
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Table Mountain Road

Table Mountain Road
92397
California, United States
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Table Mountain Observatory 2
Table Mountain Observatory 2
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1812 San Juan Capistrano earthquake

The 1812 San Juan Capistrano earthquake, also known simply as the Capistrano earthquake or the Wrightwood earthquake, occurred on December 8 at 15:00 UTC (07:00 a.m. local time) in Alta California. At the time, this was a colonial territory of the Spanish Empire. Damage occurred at several of the missions in the region of Pueblo de Los Ángeles, including Mission San Gabriel Arcángel and Mission San Juan Capistrano, where 40 parishioners were killed during the collapse of a church at an early morning service. Tree-ring and paleoseismic evidence show that there is a strong likelihood that the earthquake originated along the Mojave segment of the San Andreas Fault near Wrightwood, but other faults have been suggested as the cause. Several studies in the 1980s placed the shock along the southern Newport–Inglewood Fault near the zone of highest reported intensity. This fault is near the coast and the most significant damage at the missions, but later work at trench sites along the San Andreas Fault excluded it for this large-to-very-large shock. Dynamic rupture modelling enabled another proposal in the 2010s involving a dual-rupture scenario with both the San Andreas and San Jacinto Fault Zones. Each of these studies worked with limited data, and the effects of the shock and various fault rupture details led to Mercalli intensities of VII (Very strong) to IX (Violent) being proposed. Magnitudes from 6.9 Mla on the low end to 7.5 Mw on the high end were also presented.