with a peak design power of 2.5 MW and maximum average power of 100 kW. The output was fed via waveguide to an 84 foot parabolic reflector mounted on an altazimuth mount. It was equipped with a conical scanning feed, providing higher resolution and making automatic tracking easier. Limited operations started in 1959. The official opening was on June 6, 1959, by John Diefenbaker. For this event, a recorded message by U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower was to be broadcast from the Millstone Hill site, reflected off the Moon, and received at PARL. After some tense debugging prior to the attempt, the "trick" went off without a hitch. The main purpose of the instrument was radar observation of the aurora, which started in January 1960 and were carried out for some time. Rockets fired from the Churchill Rocket Research Range, often Black Brants, were tracked by PARL at angles similar to those that the BMEWS radar would be tracking over-pole missile launches from its sites in Alaska and Greenland. PARL also tracked Arcas rockets fired from Cold Lake. In order to support this work, an experimental computer built at the DRTE in Ottawa, known only as the DRTE Computer, was adapted to create the Digital Analyzer and Recorder, or DAR. The site was also used as a space radar system, starting a satellite tracking program in February 1960. The radar was used to track the decay of several satellites, including Sputnik 3, 4 and 5, Delta 2, and Epsilon 2. Sputnik 4 was the first test of the Vostok spacecraft; after launch its orbital period was 91.27 minutes, but on May 19 the PARL staff noted that the period was 94.26 minutes and it had been joined by seven new objects. It is assumed this was due to an explosion. PARL also used the Echo 1 satellite in a repetition of the earlier Moon-bounce experiments. After being operational only a short time, on January 31, 1961 a major fire broke out that destroyed the buildings. Contrary to the findings of the government, the "equivalent" building did not have nearly the same fireproofing as the US design, and the fire proved unstoppable. Some of the equipment was saved, and replacements forthcoming, and the radar was soon in operation again. DAR was one of the instruments lost in the 1961 fire, and a replacement had to be built, arriving in 1962. PARL