National Radio Quiet Zone

By Anupum Pant

541px-National_Radio_Quiet_Zone.svgThis 13,000 square miles of rectangular land, somewhere in the US, is the national radio quiet zone – or NRQZ.

Some of it falls in Virginia and the other major part of it is west Virginia. A tiny part of Maryland (on the top) is also included.

Living in the NRQZ means that the people who choose to live there have to sign a contract saying that they’ll never own some of the modern equipments like wi-fi, microwave, a wireless telephone etc. People living there are banned from using almost anything that uses electricity and could possibly cause a radio interference. That is because the rectangular NRQZ is home to one of the largest radio telescopes at the  National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) at Green Bank, west Virginia.

Any wireless transmitters in this very interesting piece of land spanning about 10 miles in all directions of the radio telescope has a potential to cause an interference. It’s like the 50s in here. No cellphones there. Life’s pretty different and it’s for the good of scientists from all over the world who wish to use this world-class piece of technology. This small film talks about it…

via [the Atlantic]

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