2536 UNITED STATES (West Virginia) - The collapse of the Green Bank Telescope

The 300-foot Green Bank Telescope
before and after the collapse

In 1958, the Federal Communications Commission and the Interdepartment Radio Advisory Committee established that it is need of an area in which radio transmissions to be strictly restricted by law to facilitate scientific research and military intelligence. This area of approximately 13,000 square miles is located in West Virginia, Virginia, and a small part of Maryland, and is named United States National Radio Quiet Zone. Within it, at Green Bank, in West Virginia, was completed in 1962 a a 91m (300-foot) partially steerable radiotelescope, one of the most powerful in the world.

1072, 2050 UNITED STATES (West Virginia) - West Virginia map

1071 Wste Virginia map (1)

Posted on 29.04.2014, 19.11.2015
Bordered by Virginia, Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, West Virginia is located in the Appalachian Mountains, being nicknamed The Mountain State and having the motto Montani Semper Liberi (Mountaineers are always free). The capital and largest city is Charleston, founded at the end of the 18th century. Natural resources, such as salt, coal and later natural gas contributed to the growth of the city. West Virginia became a state following the Wheeling Conventions, in which 50 northwestern counties of Virginia whose landowners owned few to no slaves decided to break away from Virginia during the American Civil War, being the only one which was formed by seceding from a Confederate state. The new state was admitted to the Union on June 20, 1863, and was a key Civil War border state.

2050 Wste Virginia map (2)

Before the arrival of europeans, the area was inhabited by Siouan language tribes such as the Moneton, but the Iroquois drove out them to reserve the upper Ohio Valley as a hunting ground in the 1670s, during the Beaver Wars. The colonies of Pennsylvania and Virginia claimed territorial rights before the American Revolutionary War, and afterwards became the western part of the state of Virginia. It is noted for its historically significant logging and coal mining industries, and its political and labor history. It is also one of the most densely karstic areas in the world. The karst lands contribute to much of the state's cool trout waters. It is also known for a wide range of outdoor recreational opportunities, including skiing, whitewater rafting, fishing, hiking, backpacking, mountain biking, and hunting.