Excerpt from The Eerie Silence by Paul Davies
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narration from the eerie silence by Paul Davies. What if he t calls tomorrow on a cold and misty morning and April 1960 Ah young astronomer named Frank Drake quietly took control of the 26 meter dish at the US National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, West Virginia. Few people understood that this moment was a turning point in science. Slowly and methodically, Drake steered the giant instrument towards a sun like star known as Tall City, 11 light years away, tuned into 1420 megahertz and settled down to wait. His fervent hope was that alien beings on the planet orbiting Tall City might just be sending radio signals our way and that his powerful radio dish would detect. Hm Drake stared at the pen and ink chart recording the antennas reception. It's fitful spasms, accompanied by a hiss from the audio feed. After about half an hour, he concluded, there was nothing of significance coming from Tal City, just the usual radio static and natural background from space. Taking a deep breath, he carefully reoriented the big dish towards a second star, Epsilon eridani. Suddenly a Siris of dramatic booms emanated from the loudspeaker on the pen recorder began frantically flying back and forth. Drake almost fell off his chair. The antenna had clearly picked up a strong artificial signal. The astronomer was so taken aback he remained rooted to the spot. For a long while, finally getting his brain in gear, he moved the telescope slightly off target. The signal faded, but when he moved the antenna back, the signal had disappeared. Could this really have been a fleeting broadcast from E. T.