We are gratified that our series of informative and entertaining shows for the general public have proven popular. In 2014 with a 2016 upgrade, we installed a spheric-mirror digital projection system to enable a whole new layer of flexibility in the star theater, including the capability to show fulldome movies. Our dome was painted a friendly gray color in 2019 to reduce light echoes and improve contrast.
Funds from ticket sales maintain and improve our surround sound and full dome visual systems and guarantee an offering of even more spectacular public events in the future. The WSU Foundation will be happy to assist you if you wish to accelerate the upgrades with a financial gift (donate to “gf007726 – Planetarium and Observatory Support Fund”).
Our offerings:
- Day time school / children’s groups ($0), scheduled by gworthey@wsu.edu.
- Evening public shows ($5. No advanced ticket sales: door only.)
- Corporate facility rental: scheduled by gworthey@wsu.edu.
Directions and parking
Directions from Stadium & Main: Turn up Stadium, immediate left at Nevada, immediate left at Washington, turn right on Spokane Street and go 2.5 blocks. Sloan Hall is on your left, but if you are parking, turn left or right on College Ave to seek parking.
For walkers coming from campus, the pedestrian bridge is the most convenient entry; come across the bridge, come in the building, then turn right. Twenty paces later, just past the staircase double doors, turn left and head down the hall to Sloan 231. There are placards pointing the way, but they are unobtrusive.
If you come in the main Sloan Hall entrance, the one with all the signage and lots of glass, you are a level below the pedestrian bridge and the planetarium. Take an immediate left, then enter the staircase with the double doors on your left. Go up one floor. The planetarium is down the hall.
- Parking near the planetarium is “Green 3” zone.
- Parking on weekends and after 5 p.m. is free.
- Buses: During business hours, parking for buses is free on Flag Lane.
- Cars: During business hours, use the AMP parking app for hourly parking, available from WSU Parking Services.
Now showing
Unveiling the Invisible Universe
7pm, Friday, July 3 and 5pm, Sunday, July 5.
A docent will point out night sky highlights and upcoming astronomical events. This is followed by a fulldome video presentation.
Modern astronomy uses light that the human eye cannot see. This includes gamma rays, X-rays, ultraviolet light, infrared light, microwave radiation, and radio waves. All of this is “light,” just at shorter or longer wavelengths, with higher or lower photon energies. And we learn a lot about the Universe’s most energetic objects using invisible light: quasars, supernovae, neutron stars, black holes, and much more.
Mars: The Ultimate Voyage
7pm, Friday, July 10 and 5pm, Sunday, July 12.
A docent will point out night sky highlights and upcoming astronomical events. This is followed by a fulldome video presentation.
Concrete plans to visit Mars exist. NASA and other space agencies have mapped out how to do it, and this short fulldome movie gives explanations and updates on the future exploration, by humans, of the Red Planet.
5000 Eyes: The Dark Energy Survey Instrument
7pm, Friday, July 17 and 5pm, Sunday, July 19.
A docent will point out night sky highlights and upcoming astronomical events. This is followed by a fulldome video presentation.
This film explores a project by the US national observatory, NOIRLAB, to explore what is known as dark energy, the mysterious tendency for the universe to accelerate its expansion over time. A special purpose instrument, DESI (Dark Energy Survey Instrument), was built to provide astronomers with data on thousands of distant galaxies.
Einstein’s Gravity Playlist
7pm, Friday, July 24 and 5pm, Sunday, July 26.
A docent will point out night sky highlights and upcoming astronomical events. This is followed by a fulldome video presentation.
Gravitational waves from cosmic phenomena are rolling through each of us all the time. With the advent of LIGO, Laser Interferometric Gravity Observatory, these waves have actually been detected. The strongest signals come from two black holes in tight orbits. As the pair orbit, they push out ripples into spacetime like ripples on a pond. The fate of the two black holes is to merge into one.
The Dark Matter Mystery
7pm, Friday, July 31 and 5pm, Sunday, Aug 2.
A docent will point out night sky highlights and upcoming astronomical events. This is followed by a fulldome video presentation.
One of the persistent puzzles of modern astronomy is the apparent presence of unseen matter, detected (so far!) only by its gravitational attraction to the sorts of matter we understand better. The short film The Dark Matter Mystery reviews some of the dozen or so observations that point to a dark matter explanation, then speculates on its nature. The most popular explanations invoke an as-yet-undiscovered subatomic particle. This hypothetical particle has mass but does not interact with normal matter, except via gravity (because it has mass).
Cosmic Mashups
7pm, Friday, Aug 7 and 5pm, Sunday, Aug 9.
A docent will point out night sky highlights and upcoming astronomical events. This is followed by a fulldome video presentation.
We live in the Milky Way, a grand pinwheel of stars and gas. Our Galaxy, the Milky Way, is home to a half trillion stars, hundreds of billions of planets, and at least 3 billion Earth near-twins. The galaxy next door, the Andromeda Galaxy, is approaching us. The pair of them will collide in another billion years or so. THAT, dear reader, is a Cosmic Mashup!