The bright lights of the LBCC planetarium shined for a crowd of students and guests who attended the “Supermassive Black Holes: Uncovering the Invisible” show on Oct. 17.
LBCC hosts free shows at the planetarium at the LAC campus in room D-326, and covers other topics related to astronomy once a month.
The shows are hosted by LBCC astronomy professors Loredana Vetere, who has five years of experience working at NASA, and Amy Fredericks, who was a data analyst for NASA’s flagship X-ray observatory the Chandra.
“Before the pandemic, we were doing a show once a month, but since we came back to campus we have tried to go back to doing it monthly, and this year we are getting better about slowly coming back to doing it once a month,” Professor Fredericks said.
The event is open to all public on a first come, first serve basis with a limited capacity for 84 people.
“I’m happy about the turnout, we even have a baby astronomer with us here” Vetere said.
This show’s main topic was about understanding black holes, their formation, and the effects they have on the universe.
“I did not know about the subject. I thought it was gonna be generally about stars, I didn’t know it was gonna be so specific about black holes, but it was unique, it was cool,” attendee David Mitchell said.
The LBCC planetarium is one of the only two planetariums in Long Beach, the second one being a non-permanent mobile planetarium at CSULB.
The videos displayed at the planetarium can vary on cost to the school. Some companies make them for free, but often they can be very expensive ranging in the hundreds to sometimes thousands of dollars.
“Whenever we advertise the monthly shows correctly, it usually fills out and sometimes some people have to miss it,“ Fredericks said.
There is still no set date for the next presentation in the planetarium, but Fredericks mentioned that a show in November is likely to happen.
