NO CELLPHONES ALLOWED!

It is hard to imagine being someplace without your cell phone, let alone someplace where nobody has one, but in a 13,000 square mile section of West Virginia and Virginia that is the norm. This is the locations of the Green Bank Radio Telescope, which is one of the most sensitive movable telescopes in the world.

In order for it to "listen" for the minute radio signals being transmitted from the various phenomena in space, they need this quiet zone. Created in 1958, this zone makes it illegal to have any cell phone or wifi signals in the area that could interfere with the work of the observatory. Microwaves are even banned!

The Yahoo Originals channel on the Yahoo Screen site recorded a short documentary clip called The Quiet Zone, that visits with some of the scientists and townspeople to get there thoughts on the situation. It does a nice job of explaining the science of the whole situation, as well as how teenagers feel about the whole thing. 

The map below shows the what the zone looks like on a map.