Galaxy Quest reruns.
Photo: Hulton Archive (Getty Images)
For decades, Americans relied on analog televisions employing UHF signals for our hundreds of (mostly inane) channel distractions, but one particular stop on the dial was nowhere to be found: channel 37. Apparently, the nationwide lack of a channel 37 on living room TV sets wasn’t some big coincidence, but an intentional decision overseen by the U.S. government based on two very obvious reasons: the location of a 400-foot radio telescope and aliens.
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Tedium post republished earlier this month by
Motherboard. According to Smith, the University of Illinois’ facilities at Vermilion River Observatory just so happened to be positioned in such a way that transmissions anywhere within a 600-mile radius—which basically includes every metropolitan area in the Midwest, some of the American South, and part of Canada—would interfere with the observatory’s then-cutting-edge equipment, which was trained on all that static raining down on us from the vastness of deep space (and, y’know, maybe other forms of intelligent life, too).