I recently flew from Moorabbin to Parkes in NSW as part of a longer trip up to Longreach and back. After landing at Parkes I grabbed a hire car and made my way to the CSIRO Radio Telescope, popularised in the 2000 Australian movie ‘The Dish‘.
I was given a really informative and interesting behind the scenes tour under, inside and on ‘The Dish’. I got to see how scientists are searching for alien life, how radio signals are received and processed, and saw The Dish moving up close.
Thanks to CSIRO and Operations Scientist John Sarkissian for a really entertaining and informative all access tour to learn more about the amazing radio telescope. It’s worth a trip to Parkes in New South Wales to see The Dish alone.
Video: Inside The Dish – the Parkes CSIRO radio telescope
Get more information on the CSIRO observatory here: https://www.parkes.atnf.csiro.au/
NASA 16mm film clip by Gary Neff, from the public domain list of videos here: https://history.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/video11.html