Planetary Radio: Space Exploration, Astronomy and Science - Small Town Universe: Inside Green Bank's Radio Quiet Zone

Episode Date: July 8, 2026

Green Bank, West Virginia is home to the world's largest fully steerable radio telescope. It's also the only town in the U.S. where cell phones and Wi-Fi are banned, so the telescope can listen for faint signals from across the Universe undisturbed. This week, we bring you a special conversation recorded after The Planetary Society's virtual screening of Small Town Universe, the documentary that follows the people whose lives are shaped by that place. Mat Kaplan, Planetary Society senior communications advisor, talks with filmmaker Katie Dellamaggiore and physicist Ellie White about making the film, the beauty and stakes of life at Green Bank, and the ongoing fight to keep the observatory funded. Before that, Kate Howells, public communications specialist, previews the total solar eclipse crossing parts of the Northern Hemisphere on August 12th, the first visible from Western Europe since 1999. And Bruce Betts, chief scientist, joins for What's Up, breaking down Hayabusa2's July 5th flyby of asteroid Torifune. Discover more at: https://www.planetary.org/planetary-radio/2026-small-town-universeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Small Town Universe. This week on Planetary Radio. I'm Sarah Al-Ahmad of the Planetary Society, with more of the human adventure across our solar system and beyond. In the mountains of West Virginia, USA, sits a town where cell phones and Wi-Fi are banned. That's also that the world's most sensitive radio telescope can listen undisturbed for signals from the cosmos. This week we're bringing you a special conversation recorded live at the Planetary Society's screening of Small Town Unuscove. universe, a documentary that follows the people whose lives are woven into that remarkable place. Matt Keplan, our senior communications advisor here at the Planetary Society, and the original creator of Planetary Radio, sat down with director Katie Delamagioere and physicist Ellie White.

They talked about the making of the film, the beauty of Green Bank Observatory, and the fight to keep its funding secure. But before that, we've got a preview of the total solar eclipse coming to European skies next month with Kate Howells, our public education specialist. And Bruce Betz, our chief scientist, joins me for What's Up, where we look at Hayabusa-2's recent flyby of asteroid Torifune. If you love planetary radio and want to stay informed by the latest space discoveries, make sure you hit that subscribe button on your favorite podcasting platform.

By subscribing, you'll never miss an episode filled with new and awe-inspiring ways to know the cosmos and our place within it. We begin with a preview of something that you really don't want to miss. On August 12th, 2026, just a little over a month after this episode airs, a total solar eclipse will sweep across parts of the northern hemisphere. And for the first time since 1999, it's going to be visible from Western Europe. The path of totality runs through Iceland, Greenland, and Spain, with up to two minutes and 18 seconds of darkness in the middle of the day. You guys know how I feel about total solar eclipses. They're one of the most magical things that we can see here on Earth.

It's pretty rare to have a situation where the angular size of the sun and the moon on the sky are exactly the same, especially on a world with life like ours. I'm joined now by Planetary Society's public education specialist Kate Howles. She's heading to Spain to catch this total solar eclipse on her honeymoon, no less. We'll talk about what makes this eclipse special, how different it's going to be from Europe's last one, which was in a world before live streams and social media, and how the Planetary Society is offering resources in French, Spanish, and German, so even more people can experience it. Hey, Kate.

Hi, Sarah. Oh, man, we only have only a month. It's a little over a month until the next major total solar eclipse. And I want to bring you on to talk about this, not only because this is a huge moment, but because as a member of our staff, you're going to be celebrating your honeymoon at this eclipse. Where are you going to be going? Yes, indeed. So my new husband and I will be going to Spain for the total solar eclipse.

We're going to be there for a couple weeks in August, but we timed it specifically to be there for the eclipse. So we'll be a little north of Madrid, got a little country, Airbnb, and we are going to take it all in. Having witnessed the last total solar eclipse that passed over North America, where we live, we're both addicted now. We're just hooked. We're unfortunately going to be lifelong. Well, I don't want to say unfortunately. We are going to be lifelong eclipse chasers, I think. I always love it when people use total solar eclipses as a moment to celebrate relationships.

And it's probably because of that imagery of like the diamond ring effect that you get right as the sun peaks out from behind totality. But it just feels like one of the most romantic space moments to me anyway. That's true. I didn't even think of the diamond ring connection, but it's very fitting for a honeymoon. Well, we only have a month out. So anybody who hasn't planned to go to this already is probably a little out of luck because everyone's really excited about it. But I still wanted to give people a moment to understand when this is happening and maybe

warn some of the people who are listening from Europe that this is going to be going down because anytime there's a total solar eclipse, I know, traffic patterns change, the sky changes, animals change, so much goes down. So even if you don't plan to be at one of these things, you should probably be aware of when it's going to be happening. So when's the next one coming up? So this is going to be August 12th of this year, 26, and it's passing across, the path of totality is passing across Greenland, Iceland, and Spain. However, pretty much all of Europe and even some parts of eastern North America are going to see partial solar eclipses. So if you live in Europe anywhere, go to planetary.org

slash eclipse, you'll find our map that will show you exactly how much of the sun will be obscured from where you live. And if you're close to the path of totality, yes, traffic is going to be a bit wild, but it's definitely worth making the journey to go see the total solar eclipse because it is unlike anything else you'll ever see in your life. However, if you can't make that trip and you're in the path of partiality, it's definitely worth getting some solar eclipse glasses and looking up safely to see the sun eclipsed because that is also a really cool phenomenon that you do not get to see very often. Yeah, there are so many cool ways that partial eclipses display themselves in the world around us, right? My first total solar eclipse was back in 2017, I want to say.

And the way that the shadows came through the leaves on the trees is something I am never going to forget. That was just amazing. But I do want to reiterate, people need to be observing this safely. So get the solar eclipse glasses now because at the last eclipse, I did speak with an optometrist about what this has done to people's eyeballs throughout the years who didn't know. And it is it is an actual thing that they can see burnt into people's retinas. Yes, staring at the sun is never a good idea. Even glancing at the sun is a bad idea. However, yes, if you're listening to this on August 11th and you don't have your eclipse glasses and you don't know where to get any, you can definitely still enjoy the,

side effects of the eclipse, like what you were talking about with the shadows of leaves. We've actually got an article on our website, again, at planetary.org slash eclipse, that tells you how to enjoy a partial solar eclipse. There are lots of cool things like you can hold a colander, like what you'd strain pasta in. You'd hold that up and look at the shadow that it casts on the ground. Instead of little circles where the light would shine through the holes in the colander, it's little crescents. And you can even just put your fingers into a sort of lattice shape and hold that out to make a crisscross shadow on the ground. And that will create little crescents in the spaces between your fingers.

It's really, really cool. Definitely worth getting outside if you can and just experiencing this eclipse in whatever way is possible for you. I feel like in North America, we've been really lucky over the last decade or so. There's been a number of these events coming past us. But this is the first time that Europe has been able to experience a total solar eclipse in a while. So, you know, I could just go into my closet and pull out 50 eclipse glasses. I literally keep a bag just in case. But I'm sure there's a lot of people who just, you know, they don't have that because

it's been so long. When was the last time that Europe experienced anything like this? Yeah, so it was almost exactly 27 years ahead of the one that's coming up. So it was August 11th, 1999. So this was the last total solar eclipse to pass over mainland Europe. people in Europe have not had a lot of opportunities to go out and experience this. So all the more reason to try to witness this in some way. And with a month left, hopefully you can still get some,

I'm sure you can get Eclipse glasses online somewhere, but make sure that they're properly certified safe Eclipse classes because you don't want some scam glasses that are actually going to burn your eyeballs. And certainly don't just stack a bunch of sunglasses on each other. That's a real no-no. Again, one of our many Eclipse resources is a guide to eclipse glasses safety. So check that out for sure.

Something I keep thinking about with this is that, you know, that was 1999. Like I can flash back to what I was doing in my personal life. But it was also a time before we had social media. And in recent years, whenever there's a total solar eclipse, part of what I love doing is watching videos as it crosses over different countries, different states and seeing their reactions. And this is the first time that Europe's going to be able to do anything like that. And I think that's really going to change the experience for people and for us

and other nations that aren't going to be watching it. Absolutely. Because not only can you experience sort of secondhand what it's like to see in eclipse, but also this just makes it so many, many more people are aware that there is an eclipse taking place. So I know that the last big total solar eclipse to pass over the United States had many, many more people travel into the path of totality than previous eclipses because the internet and social media amplified the news in advance this was happening. And so I'm sure the same thing will be true in the European eclipse. People are just so much more tuned into all different kinds of news.

It's not just the news that your local station or your national paper or whatever opts to include. If you're a person who's interested in space, you have so much more access to space information. So I'm sure there are going to be lots of people who maybe would have traveled to the 1999 eclipse in Europe. Had they known it was happening, but who will be traveling to this one, or at the very least stepping outside and looking up safely. Speaking of increasing access to the eclipse, I mean, we communicate mostly in English at the Planetary Society. Most of our members speak English as their primary language.

But this is one of those moments where we really wanted to give people an opportunity to have access to some of those resources. And so for the first time ever, we translated some of our eclipse resources for people. Can you tell people a little bit about that and where they can find them? Yeah, absolutely. This is super cool. I mean, yes, like you said, as a global organization, we've got members around the world, and we've always been curious about translating our resources. But we've got this huge website with so much content, and there are so many languages in the world,

and we've got members from everywhere. So how do you decide what to do? This was a great test case where we said, okay, this. eclipse, totality is passing over Spain. So let's definitely translate into Spanish. It's also passing over Iceland, but I think something like 99% of people in Iceland speak fluent English. So we said, all right, maybe we'll save our resources. We've translated into French and German as well, because those are countries where a huge amount of people live who are in striking distance of the total eclipse. So reasonable to expect people to travel to the path of totality, or at least

to go outside and look up and experience the partial solar eclipse. So we focused on those three languages, Spanish, French, and German, just because of population and proximity. But we're really hopeful that this will expand people's access to the kind of resources that we provide that help people know what to look for. You know, when you go outside and you, if you're in the path of totality, make sure you listen for the chirping of birds to stop. Make sure you look for the diamond ring effect that we mentioned earlier.

And then if you're in the path of a partial eclipse, got those tips on how to make the little crescent shadows and stuff like that, all of these cool resources you're not necessarily going to get just from your local news. So we wanted to make sure that those were available to as many people as possible. So we've expanded into these languages. If all goes well and it has an impact, it's definitely going to fuel future efforts to translate more of our educational resources into other languages,

which I think would just be such a great way for us to further engage people all around the world in the adventure of space. I love that so much. I mean, I want so much for us to become a more planetary society. We have members all across the world, and this is something not a lot of people know. A third of all planetary radio listeners live outside of the United States. So we're reaching people all over the world. Every single country has listened to this show, and we want to make sure that everybody

has access to space. So I'm really glad that we're doing this. Me too. Absolutely. It makes me very proud, and I hope it helps. people. Right. Well, I know you've got a lot to do to pack and get ready for this trip. You're going to be gone for a little while. We're all going to miss you. But it sounds like it's going to be just a totally magical moment to have a honeymoon and an adventure. So I'm really looking forward to

hearing about your adventure once you get back. Thanks, Sarah. I'm really looking forward to it. It's going to be a totally magical, total eclipse. I'll talk to you later, Kate. Thank you. Thanks, Sarah. If you're one of the lucky ones, catch next month's eclipse. We'd love to see your images. Send us your photos by replying to our downlinked newsletter emails or by writing to connect at planetary.org. Just let us know whether or not you're a planetary society member. You can also share them with your fellow members right inside our online member community. That eclipse is still a month out, but our next story is about a different kind of looking at the skies, one that's been going on for decades on a small town in West Virginia,

USA. Green Bank is home to the Green Bank Telescope, the world's largest fully steerable radio telescope, which is run by the National Science Foundation-supported Green Bank Observatory. To protect its work, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission established the National Radio Quiet Zone back when the observatory was founded. It's a roughly 13,000 square mile area that also shields a federal facility in Sugar Grove, West Virginia. Within the town itself, some of the town itself, some of the Cell phones and Wi-Fi are completely banned, making Greenbank the only town in the United States where that's the case. All of that so that the telescope can listen to faint signals from across the universe undisturbed. The Green Bank telescope is sensitive enough that, in theory, it could detect a cell phone on Mars, even in airplane mode.

That's the setting of the documentary Small Town Universe from filmmaker Katie Delamagioire, whose work has been supported by the Sundance Institute and the National Endowment for the Earth. Arts. Her debut film, Brooklyn Castle, was a New York Times critics pick and earned an Emmy nomination. And Small Town Universe has since been screened on PBS's Real South and at festivals across the United States. Right now, the film is only screening by request. So if you'd like to see it, check out smalltown universe film.com for upcoming U.S. screenings, or you can request a live or virtual screening of your own. And that's exactly what the Planetary Society did. On May 12, 20th, the Planetary Society hosted a live virtual screening of the film on our online member community. We followed it up with a conversation with Katie Delamagioere and physicist Ellie White, one of the film's subjects.

Ellie is now a PhD student at West Virginia University, where she's continuing her work in radio astronomy, including recent research on breakthrough listens observations of the interstellar object 3-Ey Atlas using the Green Bank telescope. One quick note before we get into this, some of the audio from that evening came through a little garbled. At one point, someone name-checked the film's animator, Lottie Kingslake, whose hand-drawn painterly work brings a lot of the film's science to life. So I wanted to make sure that you had that name in case it's hard to catch in the recording. Here's that conversation hosted by our senior communications advisor and the creator of Planetary Radio, Matt Kaplan. Welcome back, everyone. I am so glad to have seen all the wonderful comments that so many of you have been posting throughout that terrific film.

I've now seen it three times, and I think I love it more each time. So once again, congratulations. Thank you. That is lovely with you as they do that. I have a lot of questions for you, but I'd also like you to introduce our other very special. guest because I have questions for her too. So go ahead and do that and I will in a moment bring up her picture. I am very excited to introduce someone very special from the film. Her name is Ellie White. I first met Ellie and her family back in 2016 when they were helping to lead the effort

to save the Green Bank Observatory during an uncertain moment in its history. Ellie and her mom Dina became important voices in GBO's growing advocacy movement, helping people understand why this place matters, not just as a world-class scientific facility, but as a sorts of inspiration for future generations of scientists like Ellie. Even back then as a high school student, she had this incredible way to connect science and humanity and big ideas and everyday ideas in a way that felt like super-brounded and relatable, especially to someone like me. Since 2016, you might not be surprised to learn that Ellie has accomplished quite a lot. She earned her undergraduate and master's degrees in physics at Marshall University, where she also taught intro to astronomy.

She's worked on projects and instrumentation and study with the GBO and REO, UC Berkeley City Research and the SETI Institute. And along the way, she's also received the 2021 Study Forward Award, a prestigious Goldwater Scholarship and an NSF graduate researcher. powership. Beyond all those accomplishments, what's also so remarkable about Ellie is that she embodies that thing that I wanted to capture in this film, which is that the idea that science is deeply human. She's very generous and committed to sharing science with others, and that's something that continues with her work is Govreen Bank and its ongoing efforts to help promote the future of the observatory, protect the future of the observatory. It has been such a privilege to document even just a small part of her and her family's story. I'm so happy that she's so

so fast. So please welcome, Ellie. Ellie, thank you so much for joining us and for your absolutely wonderful contribution to this great film. Thank you, Katie, for the lovely introduction and the only reason that I am part of this film, to thank you to you and your team for making such a beautiful piece of art. And of course, my family is not for them. I would not be here either, of course. And thank you, Matt, and Planetary Society for hosting this wonderful screening and for inviting me to participate. It means a lot. And thank you for all that you guys do to support science education and advocacy. It's super important. So, yeah, happy to be here. We're going to talk more about the advocacy side, because that's something you're deeply involved with

as well. And I will have a link. Because, sad to say, the Green Bank Observatory, is once again under threat because of the possible cancellation of funding, or at least deep reduction in funding. But we'll come back to that. Ellie, I'm seeing such amazing reactions to people. I'm really glad we made you a surprise. We've got some Ongs. We've got Joe says, Ellie, yes.

Grace says, she famous. Hi, Elri. Hi, Ellie. Anyway, it's just, it's very, very nice to see. So, and congratulations on that NSF fellowship that you received, what, just a couple of years ago or last year? I just finished my first year as a fellow, so yeah. And so now your studies continue, but you're a graduate assistant, and as we heard from Katie, you're teaching. Yes, I just finished teaching this spring.

That's one of my favorite things to do. So if any of my students happen to be watching, I feel proud of you guys. So I'm actually going to be starting my PhD at Western University in the fall and continuing on with that fellowship. Fantastic. Congratulations. There's so much that I want to talk to both of you about. Ellie, I'm going to turn back to Katie for a moment and learn a little bit more about the film. Just beginning with how in the world did you come up with the thought that, oh, this is a story.

that we should tell as a documentary. Yeah, I didn't come to this as someone who knew anything about Green Bank or really anything about radio astronomy at all. I was inspired by the idea that there was a town without cell phones and Wi-Fi. At the time that I learned about Green Bank, I was kind of grappling with my own questions of what it meant to connect with people via this technology. My mom had just died and kind of was missing. her cell phone calls, but also was way too addicted to my own cell phone for other reasons.

Yeah, I was just like, well, what if we just, what if it all just went away? And so a Google search led me to Greenbank. And yeah, as a filmmaker, I knew there was something there, but I wasn't quite sure of like the way in yet or like what would make the film more meaningful than just about a town without cell phones. And it only took like one trip there for me to realize that the observatory was really the heartbeat of the film and the anchor. And that some of the wonderful folks that I met in town, including George and Donnie and, of course, Karen and the boys, and eventually Ellie would kind of orbit the telescope with their personal stories

and that they would kind of bring to life like these bigger ideas about radio astronomy that, to be honest, like, I knew nothing about. And I knew we needed a human way in for other folks of me to kind of understand and appreciate it. And so that kind of became the inspiration for the film was to go in deep with the issue of an story. How did you manage to get your camera, and I assume a crew, of course, into so many intimate situations, really deeply affecting situations with Ellie and with so many others? Yeah, it's an interesting question and probably a question that maybe some of them can answer from no point of view. view, but from my point of view, it took a long time to make this film. So nowadays, content is created so quickly. And, you know, you go out and shoot something to edit it, you upload it, boom,

done. But this film took like eight years to me. And so that was like real time spent with people and going back and going back and going back. And so I think with that hopefully just comes like a level of trust, right, through that kind of continued connection and not. not just like, you know, going into Green Bank and trying to tell a story in a couple days and then that's it. I think that, yeah, the investment of time probably is a big part of it. Eight years making this, but not your first outing. I mean, I've only seen the trailer so far for Brooklyn Castle, but now I very much want to see this terrific story about these kids, most of them disadvantaged in Brooklyn, of course, and they're chess champions.

And this film, I mean, I think I only know about a couple of the awards, New York Times critics pick, Emmy nominated. Obviously, you hit your stride pretty well, even with your first attempt. Yeah, so that film is available if anyone wants to watch it. It's on Apple and Amazon, I believe, but winning chess team from Brooklyn. who knew that we had chal superstars here in our public school system. Again, I think that the unexpectedness is kind of what drew me to that story, much like Greenbank kind of like, you know, uncovering a story that kind of breaks a cliché or kind of challenges your assumptions about a place or like,

what you hold people somewhere might be like. In fact, my kids who are 12 and 13 now go to our public school. They were not born when they took out. They do not play chess, but they do go to that school. switching the film. So yeah, I invite everyone to go rent it if there's. You want to say something about your professional and life partner at the company that you run? Like calling down here Nelson? Yeah, yeah, Nelson, who also edited this film, right? Yes, he edits everything because he is the best editor I know. So thank you he sticks around and he keeps doing it.

There were several comments as we were rolling the film about the terrific animation. And that also struck me the first time that I saw it, because it really adds a lot. And it's beautiful. Can you talk about that a little bit? Yeah, I think from the very beginning, we knew that we wanted to bring some of more complex ideas to life through animation and wanted to approach it in a way that felt like it was in the spirit of the film with a human touch. so to speak. And so the animation has like this painterly hand-drawn human kind of collage feel to it. And that was like very intentional because we wanted it to feel like the film,

feel intimate like the film. And so, yeah, we stumbled across this artist's work. And she seemed like she got it and she nailed it. Her name was like it was amazing to collaborate with her. And I think that a lot of people love the animation, just like you said. So I think it does its job and it like kind of helps to, yeah, explain those concepts, but also it's just really beautiful, which I think is kind of in line with like the theme of the film, the beauty of the universe, like the animation is beautiful.

It is a wonderful contrast between the glory of the universe, beautiful in itself, and this gorgeous little piece of land that the United States has set aside for this very special work. And, you know, Ellie, I invite you to comment on that as well. But this sense that it is really a film about, in some ways anyway, it's also about beautiful human beings. But it's about beauty in that way at many scales. Yeah, yeah, for sure. I mean, my family and I, our relationship with the observatory kind of predated me. So my parents first went there in the 90s.

And when my brother and I were young, they, of course, took us to the observatory many times. And eventually, you know, I got into astronomy, wanted to, you know, be an astronomer or a physicist. And so we started going up there, you know, much more often. And, of course, you see what happens in the film. But, and I totally agree, the animations do such a great job of capturing both, kind of how beautiful it is, but also, you know, as Katie was mentioning, kind of cozy feel, I guess. But it's a really special place for a lot of reasons. And, you know, I've had the good fortune both to experience this type as a visitor and as an employee a few years back between my undergrad and my master's. I worked there as a data analyst. You know, we have a lot of special friends that live there, you know, between the beauty of the natural drownings and the telescopes themselves.

Quite a few in addition to the Green Lake telescope, the main one that people know, of course, you saw the 140 foot in the Selm, and that one I think is one of the most beautiful telescopes. It's the largest equatorially mounted telescope in the world. So it's an amazing kind of juxtaposition of natural beauty as well as the beauty of taking new knowledge through science. To say nothing of that small dish that we saw being placed in concrete, I assume in your backyard there back at home. That dish is still there, I assume. It is. I'm embarrassed to say it is not yet functioning.

But that's one of my goals for the summer actually is to get that started. So there's actually a really cool project out there called Wow at Home. If people are interested in kind of researching, you know, ways to get involved in radio astronomy. There's also the Society of Amateur Radio Astronomers. They offer some pretty cool kits and things if you're interested in, like building your own radio telescope and talking to some pretty cool people that know a lot about what they're doing. And, of course, the Z Universe project is another great citizen. avenues. Yeah, maybe not. A lot of times those are a bit more like computer-based, but sometimes that's what you need to write. So if you don't want to get into some of the equipment and that

kind of thing, if you're like more interested in, you know, contributing to efforts to help scientists analyze data. You know, Zuniverse is a fantastic project. I've used it with my classes, with my intro astronomy students. And it always seems to be a hit. So I recommend Z universe for sure. I'm very proud to mention most of our members probably know that I mean a planetary society has been part of the SETI effort for many many many years and we helped to start the SETI at home project

which I used to have running on my machine back when it was active and it was nice to note that I was a little bit of the search we'll be right back after the short break Hi I'm Kirby Runyon planetary geologist at the Planetary Science Institute and founder of planetary experience consulting. Think of your favorite photograph from the moon or Mars. Have you ever wanted to read the stories

recorded in those rocks? You can learn how. This October, I'm co-leading a three-day expedition to some of New Mexico's finest planetary geology analog sites, and I'd love for you to join me. From October 15th through 19th, we'll explore tube-fed lava flows at Carrizozo, soak in the volcanic desolation of Kilbourne Hole Volcanic Crater, and stand at sunset over the sublime White Sands National Park. These are some of the same landscapes where Apollo and Artemis astronauts have trained. We'll also visit Spaceport America, the New Mexico Museum of Space History, and the Los Cruces Challenger Learning Center.

Space is limited to just 20 people, and for every person who registers, the Planetary Society will receive a donation. Head to planetary.org slash travel to learn more and save your spot. I hope to see you there. One of the beautiful human beings in this film is known to a lot of us in this field and fans of this field. Frank Drake makes a brief appearance, Katie, in a couple of scenes.

Just an absolutely lovely man. And I'm glad that you were able to include him as one of the true founders of the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. How long a time did you have with Frank? Oh, dear, that footage, we did not have the joy of capturing ourselves. Oh, okay. from the agency. Unfortunately, yeah, we did not have the pleasure of me. Ellie, in your time there, I mean, we lost Frank, of course, just not too many years ago. Did you ever run into him or see him around town and around the observatory?

I did. And actually, I was working there when he passed. That was an early sad day. It was at the same time, you know, very special to be able to look at the telescope that he used to do his search, you know, while remembering him. So back in 2016, when I was still in high school, my mom and I crashed Breakthrough Listen conference that was being held at the observatory. So Breakthrough Listen, of course, as mentioned in the film, is currently the largest study effort to date.

And so they were having their conference at Greenbank, and we were there, and Frank was there. I think the first time that I saw him was actually at the Dollar General down the street, but we didn't talk until we were in that conference. And he was very kind, of course, and signed. a book for me and we chatted briefly, but yeah, I just remember he was a very, very, you know, kind and gentle guy and just really great to talk to. A truly lovely man, yeah, absolutely. And a pioneer, which is the direction that you appear to be headed in. I mean, not only do you obviously share what our former CEO and now chief ambassador, Bill Nye, calls the P.B.N.J, the passion, beauty,

in joy of space and science. But you really seem very dedicated to sharing that PBNJ. I mean, your teaching and just what we saw in the film of you with those young children. Absolutely. Yes. So I knew that I enjoyed outreach from early on, but I didn't realize how much I would love it until I actually got in the classroom and started teaching as the graduate assistant. That was really, I mean, it's not exaggerating to say that was life-changing for me. you know, getting to work with students on a weekly basis and see their progress and, you know, hear about, you know, maybe struggles or joys they were going through and be able to share, you know, basically get to spend, you know, four hours a week yapping at them about, you know, my favorite

space topics. That's never a bad thing, but they might say otherwise. It was just a really wonderful experience and I'm very, very lucky to have had that through Marshall. people sometimes ask me like what's the most exciting thing that you found in your research or things like that and I would say you know working with my students you know seeing how hard they work their dedication you know many of them are like working multiple jobs put themselves through school and they're still like showing up every day and you know doing their best and I just find that super inspiring and each of them are unique and special and I love hearing their stories and I love being able to share my passion for astronomy and basic science with them in whatever, like, small way that I can and, you know, helping them, like get involved in things like, you know, like Suniverse or, like, you know, using the 20-meter telescope at the observatory, we did that as part of our class. There's so much as I love about teaching.

I could talk for a really long time about that, but now that I've taught once, I don't think I'll ever be able to stay away from the classroom for long. That's great. That's a gift to your students. Yeah. What is the West Virginia Alliance for STEM and the Arts? Thank you for asking that. That's actually the non-profit that my family, particularly my mom, Dina, and the rest of my family and I started, along with several other wonderful people. I'm doing with the goal to try and help connect West Virginia students to exciting STEM and arts opportunities around the state and beyond.

One of our projects was actually programmed by my brother in addition to some other interns, Zariah and another job. And my mom, Dina, so team track the point of that is basically to let kids, you know, explore different references from different like museums, science museums, you know, art museums from around the state and elsewhere during COVID. And it is still up. It's still available. But we were trying to figure out a way to make some of those resources available more broadly. And in addition to that, the nonprofit has hosted a screening tour of small town universe.

And so just trying to, you know, audiences in West Virginia to experience the film and, and my mom might say, coordinated this, along with several like panels and events around the screenings to create that discussion and make sure to figure the film with the people that it's kind of about. Katie, we've had so many people in the chat. And before we got started today, who told us, oh, I can't do this or, you know, they're in Europe and it's four o'clock in the morning or whatever. who want to know how they're going to be able to see the film in the future. And, you know, what can they do to be able to get it on a screen near them or on a service they can get? Yeah, thank you. I would love for as many people to see it as possible. We had a film festival screening tour, and the film was on PBS for a short while.

And now we're in, like, kind of the third phase of things, which is a grass, Roots Impact campaign where we take the film out and share it with organizations like yours. And so we're trying to put the film in front of real-life audiences as many real-life audiences as possible before we make it available on iTunes or Amazon, which is coming down the road. So first and foremost, if anybody is interested in bringing the film to their community, they can just go to small town universe film.com and there's information there on how to get in touch with us and request the screening. And then you work with everybody to figure out

what they can afford and accommodate for their group. We really want to make it accessible. So there's in-person screenings that we're booking. And so it's not really on demand yet. But if you sign up for our newsletter, which is also on the website, or follow us on Instagram or Facebook, which is also on the website, you'll be

sure to find out when it is available on digital platforms, which will probably be by the end of the year, I would imagine. So yeah, yeah, just kind of follow us on socials or sign up for a newsletter and you'll get news on when it's about. Or more broadly. Smalltown Universefilm.com is the website and there you can access all the ways to Gendt. And you can also learn more about Katie's entire team that worked on the film and other ways to be involved and just the background of the film as well.

All right, Ellie, I'm going to come back to you. But first, I'm going to post that very simple URL in the chat. And for those people who maybe aren't looking at the chat, it's easy. It's go greenbank observatory.org.org, just like we are planetary.org. How do you feel about the fact that we are back kind of where this film started? I want to ask both of you, but we'll start with you, Ellie, that this absolutely irreplaceable facility, which should be the pride of all Americans. and maybe all humans, is once again threatened.

Yeah, I think anybody that's worked on science, of course, you email it with all the advocacy work that you do know what a struggle it always is to make sure that funding is secured and that these wonderful facilities like the Greenberg, Zerter, retain their funding because they do create such a huge impact on their communities. Of course, you saw that in the film. You may have heard Mike Holstein, the business. director at the time talking about, you know, how much it contributes to the local community, the local economy. You know, it contributes 30 million a year, at least into its founding community,

and that's about three times its operating budget per year. And that, of course, might arguably be as big an impact as that is, but arguably maybe one of the smaller impacts compared to how much of an influence it has, the facility has on students in West Virginia across the country, across the world, ranging from K-12, up through graduate students, postdocs, up through. retirees. So I didn't want to talk about this a little bit in case anyone here is listening and would like to do something to help the observatory that's always super appreciated. And of course, the link that you still kindly shared, Matt, is a great place to start. So to get a little bit more background, the NSS-2027 draft budget proposes drastic cuts to the GPS budget as well as potentially

decommissioning and disposition of the site, which means either shutting it down or changing how it operates beyond recognition. In other words, it would no longer be a scientific research or education focused facility. So that's why to my family and I, especially again, my mom, Dina, along with many others, formed this advocacy group, get organized for the Green Bank of Sletorritory or GoGBO. To leave a force formed that back in 2016, but we've had to kind of re-up our efforts every time a threat like this comes up and, you know, something similar happened last year, very similar wording in the 2026 budget. Now they're proposing the same cuts again in 2027. If you want to interest in helping, there's a couple ways you can do it.

One is you can write and or call your congresspeople. We have guidance information and draft language that you can use on our website. So in the process of trying to set up an endowment to help try and sustain GBO's future as a science education focus facility, there is a donate button on a website where you can donate to those efforts if you want. Thank you for the opportunity to talk about this and again for all that you and your team are doing to protect science funding. You know, it's always always donated. Absolutely. And it's one of our primary purposes at the Planetary Society.

I have just one more question, but Katie, before I ask, I want to see if you have any final words or anything that you would like to share. The idea that this film could become, has become, and will continue to be, a tool to advocate for the GBO is really special to me and my team. I do believe in the power of film and storytelling to move people to action. So I'm hoping the film can be a tool in the arsenal to do that. Well, thank you for that. I mentioned the planetary society and what we're up to and how thrilled we have been

to be able to bring this film to our members in our member community. running throughout the film was yet another personality, another great contributor, who was, of course, long gone, sadly, before the film was created, but had a huge influence on you, Ellie. And that, of course, is the co-founder, one of the three co-founders of the society, Carl Sagan. And we just love seeing you holding up his book Cosmos and hearing about the influence that it had on you. can you maybe add a little bit to that and say how important his legacy was is to you? Absolutely, yes. So I can't say enough good things about, you know, Carl Sagan's writing, his works, how much that's, that influenced me, you know, especially early on as I was getting into, you know, astronomy thinking about whether it was something I could do or not. And so I think Cosmos was kind of the first, like, you know, kind of grown up science book that I ever read. just kind of seeing how he presented science in a way that's really pretty artistic, because

as, you know, it kind of mentions in the film that that, when I was 12 or 13, I kind of thought that I would be an artist, but at the same time, I wasn't really sure if that was the path that I wanted. And so once I started reading, you know, Carl Sagan's books, things like that, the way that he kind of conveyed astronomy and science as something that's not just, you know, interesting from a kind of logical and scientific perspective, but from like a storytelling perspective and an artistic perspective, how understanding astronomy helps us understand ourselves and where we came from and where we're going. I think seeing things in the bigger picture, the way that he was so amazingly gifted at conveying, really changed my view of both what I could do and how the world

is. I mean, that sounds kind of goofy, but that really just gave me a, a bigger view of the part that we all play in the universe. Even though we might be small, we're still a very significant part of the story of our universe. And so I think seeing how he connected all those dots and just was such an amazing storyteller and really an artist at the same time as being a scientist was really moving and, yeah,

had a big impact on me and continues to. There's still many books of his I've not read yet. They're on my shelf. I'm working through them. At the same time, I kind of don't want to work through them too fast because, you know, I always want to have a new one to read with it. Yeah. Yeah. You know, great scientist, great storyteller. That's the key word. Katie, is that the goal that you strive for as well? Because you've certainly told this story very, very well. Thank you. And, yeah, it is as a filmmaker. I think the only job we have is to tell a good story and then, at least, in my opinion, all the other stuff flows from that. The understanding and the connection and the action and the impact

kind of all starts with the kernel of a good story. Thank you again so much for being part of this first ever virtual screening of a film in the Planetary Society member community. We are extremely grateful. Go greenbank observatory.org and small town universe film.com. One more time, Katie, Ellie, thanks for this, and best of luck to both of you. Thank you, now.

Thank you, everyone. Thank you so much. That conversation with Katie Delamagioere and Ellie White is a great reminder of how much a place like Greenbank shapes the people who call it home. It's where Ellie found her path into astronomy and where students, teachers, and researchers still build their futures today. If you want to help protect it, head to go, go. Greenbank Observatory.org, where you can find guidance on contacting Congress about ways to support the observatory directly. And if you'd like to see the film yourself, there are screenings happening all across the United States. To find one near you, or to request one of your own,

head to smalltown universe film.com slash tune dash in. Coming up, Dr. Bruce Betts, our chief scientist joins me for what's up. We're going to talk about a risky, originally unplanned flyby that just paid off. On July 5th, the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency, or Jaxa's Hayabusa 2 spacecraft, swept past a small double-lobe asteroid called Torifune. Hyabusa 2 launched back in December 2014, and is the successor to the original Hayabusa mission, which visited the peanut-shaped asteroid Itokawa in 2005. Hayabusa 2 itself is already famous for bringing back samples from asteroid Ryugu, samples that turned out to contain all five. live nucleo bases found in DNA and RNA. Tori Funé belongs to the same family of asteroids as Ryugo and Idokawa, the Apollo asteroids,

a group of Earth crossing near-Earth objects. It circles the sun roughly every 383 days. Hayabusa 2 captured images and thermal data during the flyby, and it's all still coming back to Earth. That's next. Hey, Bruce. Hey, Sarah. So we got a bit of a grab bag of episode.

So topics this week. We got some eclipse content, some small town universe, but now also a story that we talked a little bit about, I want to say, two weeks ago on the show. We were talking about all the upcoming asteroid moments, and one of them finally happened. Hayabusa 2 reached Tori Funet on July 5th. So I wanted to talk a little bit about it because we got a really cool photo out of it. Yeah. And they were testing close flybys. And as I understand it, they got really close.

I mean, they've also used the same spacecraft to sample an asteroid at Ryugu. So, so yeah, high boost too. Impressive launched in 2014, did its primary mission, which was to go to Ryugu, hang out there, grab some sample, bring it back, drop it off in the sample return capsule. And then the orbiter spacecraft, fly-by spacecraft was just hanging out. So they nicely targeted another asteroid. And so there's a lovely picture of Torfune, a 450-meter asteroid that is double lobes. So it looks like someone glued two balls together again, very much like Hayabusa, one, which was just called Hybusa, found at Idaqawa.

And we've seen at various asteroids and objects now, this two lobes thing. And pretty cool. And they were like 100 million kilometers from Earth at the time. And they were going to try to do an 800 meter away pass. I'm not sure how close they got, but they made it. And they got a nice picture. I mean, I think it's pretty brave after your spacecraft has gone through its primary mission to try to do something that close. I'm sure that gave a few people a little bit of the, you know, a little bit of anxiety doing it.

But really interesting. Once you're done with your primary mission, you're just, it's expendable. I guess, but they still have another target after this, right? Yeah, no, I know. It's not, you know, they don't want to splatter it into something, but yes, they're going to 1998, KY26 arriving in 20131. And this is supposed to be only 11 meters across.

And so it would be the smallest asteroid we've flown by in space and one that would make a heck of a fireball, but not do any damage on the surface, presumably. If it hit, anyway, it's not hitting. I'm just, that's a side note of, but it'll be interesting because these objects are flying around out there and we don't see them until they fireball in the Earth's atmosphere occasionally. So getting a close up with that will be interesting. But I'm sure they've got a lot more data coming back, I presume, from, in fact, I know,

from Torafune. So that'll be interesting to see what we see. and gets more pretty pictures of the dog bone kind of astride, and it'll be good. It's so interesting that so many of these are these double-lobed, weird little guys. Like, I wonder what percentage of them are literally two asteroids that kind of came together and formed this contact binary, and what amount of them are, used to be one body that flung off material and then came back together somehow. I don't know how we would figure that out, but.

We don't completely. But we're getting more and more statistics between flybys where we can distinguish something even of close flybys of Earth and then, of course, the spacecraft. So we're starting to see some shapes that are repeating themselves. And so presumably similar processes going on. But very cool. If you haven't, check out the picture of Torfune. Tori Funet.

And I'll put that picture on the website for this episode of Planetary Radio. so people can look at it. It's strikingly similar to eat Okawa. That's really cool. It looks a little like it has cornflakes on it, kind of like some of the others. That may be just me being hungry. I'm not sure. All space objects are food if you try hard enough. I don't mean that. Quote from Sarah. All space objects are food if you try hard enough. Anyway, congratulations to Jaxa on another successful use of a spacecraft that already has given us a lot. Let us go on to... Reimms matter!

Random SpaceFack! Rewind. So, there's been this thing going on that some of the world cares about. It's soccer. We call it soccer. And there's a World Cup of Mundial World Cup. So in honor of that, we will do a soccer ball related random space fact. And if the sun, the sun were the size of a soccer ball.

So there it is sitting there. So soccer ball size sun, Neptune would be almost a kilometer away. It'd take you a long time to get that ball all the way over there. Yeah, no, it's really kind of far. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, far out. All right, everybody, go out there, look up the night sky and think about making that goal.

Goal. Thank you. And good night. We've reached the end of this week's episode of Planetary Radio. But we'll be back next week with more space science and exploration. If you love the show, You can get planetary radio t-shirts at planetary.org slash shop, along with lots of other cool spacey merchandise.

Help others discover the passion, beauty, and joy of space science and exploration by leaving your review and a rating on platforms like Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Your feedback normally brightens our day, but helps other curious minds find their place in space through Planetary Radio. You can also send us your space thoughts, questions, and poetry at our email. Planetary Radio at planetary.org. Or if you're a Planetary Society member, leave a comment in the Planetary Radio space

in our online member community. Planetary Radio is produced by the Planetary Society in Pasadena, California, and has made possible by our members from all over this beautiful planet. You can join us as we help support the planetary community across the world at planetary.org slash join.

Mark Hilverta and Ray Paletta are our associate producers. Casey Dreyer is the host of our monthly space policy edition and Matt Kaplan hosts our monthly book club edition. Andrew Lucas is our audio editor. Josh Doyle composed our theme, which is arranged and performed by Peter Schlosser. I'm Sarah Al-Ahmad, the host and producer of Planetary Radio.

And until next week, add Astra.