Private Show Reservation Information

The planetarium seats 60 people. Private programs are offered by reservation any day. School/Summer Camp groups can not schedule during school hours Monday through Friday to protects the school children from Covid.

The cost of a 45 minute program is $40, an additional hour is $30 ($70 total). Payment for the program can be made at the door with cash, check (made out to YCAS) or credit/debit card.

The money raised from these programs goes towards the cost of using the planetarium and developing other astronomy programs for the community. Groups are encouraged to join together to fill the planetarium with other scouts or family members. Write to info@astroyork.com for more information or to make a reservation.

The planetarium is closed May 25th to September 1st for summer school cleaning.

Live programs

StarWatch

Planetarium Show Spotlights Tonight’s Constellations and Tour of the Solar System

Learn how to find the planets and constellations that are visible in York’s night sky. Become a star watcher by exploring the current night sky, locate visible planets and constellations, and enjoy some sky lore. Receive a star map and get answers to questions such as:

What can be seen with a telescope tonight?
*How do I find the North Star?
*Is there really a bear in the sky?
*Why do stars have different colors?
*What are the names of the brightest stars?
*Why does Jupiter have different colored clouds?

Girl Scout Programs

Level	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Daisey	One World, One Sky: Big Bird’s Adventure, StarWatch	45 min
Brownie	Rusty Rocket’s Last Blast, StarWatch	100 min
Junior	Rusty Rocket’s Last Blast, StarWatch	100 min
Cadette	Two Small Pieces Of Glass, StarWatch	100 min
Senior	From Earth To The Universe, StarWatch	100 min
Ambassador	From Earth To The Universe, StarWatch	100 min

While programs are geared toward families they may not be appropriate for very young children who are not able to sit through 35-minute presentations.

New Telescope Clinic

Did you get a new telescope recently or discover an unused one in your attic? Experience has shown that the first night out with a new telescope can be daunting as you try to perform all the initial setup work required. Consequently, many new telescopes are used once or twice, then never again due to frustration. To help get you started properly, the York County Astronomical Society is offering a New Telescope Clinic to help you set up your telescope the first time and learn how to use and enjoy it.

Bring your telescope and all the items that came with it (including batteries, if required, and the instruction manual). We will check out your telescope, help you align the finder scope, show you how your telescope works, and help you with some initial observations of the sky (clear skies permitting). Afterwards, take home a free Star Chart to help you continue your exploration of the nighttime sky.

Recorded programs

A Part of the Sky Called Orion

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Night sky, astronomy, cultures	general audiences, grades 5+	26 min

A fantastic sky lore program covering the Greek, Egyptian, and Inupiaq cultures. We learn how each of these rich cultures viewed the same stars, but had different stories and images. Told in first-person in the context of the teller’s life, we experience their ancient star lore and imagery. This show is best for 2nd grade and above, but even younger ones will enjoy the storytelling imagery and theme. This is storytelling at its best. A wonderful blend of imagery, music, and word; it’s a treat for all.

Back to the Moon For Good

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Moon, space travel, space science	general audiences, grades 2+	25 min

Back To The Moon For Good, an exciting, educational fulldome show narrated by award-winning actor Tim Allen. The 25-minute digital film highlights the history of exploring the moon and provides an insider’s look at the teams vying for the $30 million Google Lunar XPRIZE, the largest incentivized prize in history. The contest has ended with no winners. Back To The Moon For Good begins with a tour through the history of lunar exploration, tracing back to the 1960s and 1970s. We hear from some of the teams racing to land a robotic spacecraft on the moon and win the Google Lunar XPRIZE. The audience is taken on a successful launch, landing and tour of the lunar surface. The show ends with an enticing visualization of a future settlement on the moon.

Chasing the Ghost Particle: From the South Pole to the Edge of the Universe

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Neutrinos, space science	general audiences, grades 7+	30 min

Deep in the ice at the heart of Antarctica, the biggest and strangest detector in the world waits for mysterious messengers from the cosmos. The detector is Ice Cube! The messengers are neutrinos, ghostly particles that give us tantalizing looks into world of exploding stars and black holes. This show tells the incredible story of how an international team of scientists and engineers transformed one billion tons of Antarctic ice into a telescope. Building Ice Cube was a titanic endeavor driven by our human passion for discovery. Witness stunning views of the South Pole, captivating animations of the Ice Cube detectors capturing a neutrino collision-and eye-catching views of the cosmos. Chasing the Ghost Particle: From the South Pole to the Edge of the Universe will take you on a journey you will never forget.

Comets & Discovery

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Comets, space science, astronomy	general audiences, grades 3+	30 min

In “Comets & Discovery” we follow two intrepid comet hunters in first-person. One, a modern explorer. The other, Caroline Herschel. The famous 18th century comet huntress that ruled the skies for many generations. With both, we learn how they each searched the skies, made their discoveries, and reported them for other astronomers to bear out. We also learn about, depending on the century of the observer, what people thought comets were and their importance to them.

Cosmic Castaways

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Galactic collisions, space science	general audiences, grades 7+	23 min

When you look into the sky, the background not-quite-blackness is filled with the diffuse light of stars lost in the space between galaxies, these are the Cosmic Castaways. When galaxies pass in the night they gravitationally twist and turn one another. Sometimes the interactions are nothing more than a cosmic side-swipe; two galaxies cross and both come out a little bit damaged. Sometimes the interactions merge and where once two shiny galaxies orbited now only once bursts with the light of a billion stars. No matter what happens, these events leave stellar orphans. As the galaxies tear into one another, stars get gravitationally trapped in a tug-a-war between the two systems. Eventually, both galaxies will give up their pulling and let the stars drop. These stars are left abandoned in the space between the galaxies and scattered around the newly formed systems.

Cosmic Origins Spectrograph

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Hubble, space science	general audiences, grades 7+	30 min

A 30 minute film highlighting the current research of C.O.S. aboard the Hubble Space Telescope, the last instrument installed by the NASA astronauts. The Cosmic Origin Spectrograph is allowing us an unprecedented view into the vast spaces between galaxies which surrounds our own Milky Way and helping us discover the structure of the Universe.

Dark

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Dark Matter, Cosmology	general audiences, grades 11+	20 min

DARK is a fulldome movie that explains and explores the nature of Dark Matter, the missing 80% of the mass of the Universe. The search for Dark Matter is the most pressing astrophysical problem of our time - the solution to which will help us understand why the Universe is as it is, where it came from, and how it has evolved over billions of years - the unimaginable depths of deep time, of which a human life is but a flickering instant. But in that instant, we can grasp its immensity and, through science, we can attempt to understand it.

Defying Gravity: It is Rocket Science!

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Black Holes, Gravity, General Physics	general audiences, grades 4+	24 min

Meet Apollo Aurora, host of the Planetarium Channel’s universally loved gravity news source, Defying Gravity, It Is Rocket Science! With special robot correspondents Apple 1-6-8-6 and EGR-1, Apollo and her team will explore rocket power, gravity on other planets, monstrous black holes and even what keeps us grounded on Earth! Tune into this brand new planetarium show and uncover the mysteries of gravity.

Distant Worlds - Alien Life?

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Extrasolar planets	general audiences, grades 7+	53 min

Do you ever wonder if extraterrestrial life actually exists? Come enjoy a fulldome viewing of Distant Worlds - Alien Life. Not only does the film investigate the conditions required for life, beginning with the planets and moons in our Solar System, but it also ventures out to some of the newly-discovered exoplanets orbiting other stars. Potentially habitable exoplanets are being discovered regularly - worlds that are not only very far away, but also strange and unfamiliar. What could life on these worlds look like? What are the chances of encountering intelligent life in the future, and how might we detect it? Don’t miss this unique opportunity to surpass the confines of Earth and delve into unfathomable cosmic spaces, all from the comfort of our planetarium.

Flight Adventures

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Aeronautics, space science, astronomy	general audiences, grades 3+	21 min

In Flight Adventures, dreams of flying, model aircraft and a young girl and her grandfather come together in this multimedia planetarium show about the science of aeronautics. Learn about famous inventors and aviators of the past and the pioneers who first revealed the 4 forces of flight. See images of aircraft past, present and future and imagine where flight might take us. Presented in high-definition full-dome digital video, “Flight Adventures” is unlike anything you’ve ever encountered.

Forward! To the Moon

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Aeronautics, space science, astronomy	general audiences, grades 4+	26 min

NASA’s 21st century Artemis program, named after the Greek moon Goddess and twin of Apollo, is the next step in our mission to explore the universe and land the first woman and person of color on the surface of the Moon.

From the Blue Planet to the Red Planet

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Solar System	general audiences, grades 4-7	32 min

Journey to the year 2132 and follow a young woman named Carina as she studies geology on a future mars base. Her younger brother, Aidan, is back on earth preparing for an internship on the Lunar Base. Experience living on Earth and Mars from the perspective of these siblings of the future in From the Blue Planet to the Red Planet.

From Earth to the Universe

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
General Astronomy	general audiences, grades 4+	30 min

The night sky, both beautiful and mysterious, has been the subject of campfire stories, ancient myths and awe for as long as there have been people. A desire to comprehend the Universe may well be humanity’s oldest shared intellectual experience. Yet only recently have we truly begun to grasp our place in the vast cosmos. To learn about this journey of celestial discovery, from the theories of the ancient Greek astronomers to today’s grandest telescopes, we invite you to experience From Earth to the Universe.

Hot and Energetic Universe

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
High Energy Astronomy	general audiences, grades 4+	29 min

“The Hot and Energetic Universe” presents the fascinating world of high energy astrophysics. High energy astrophysics plays a key role in understanding the universe, as these radiations reveal the processes in the hot and violent universe. High energy astrophysics probes hot gas in clusters of galaxies, which are the most massive objects in the universe. It also probes hot gas accreting around supermassive black holes in the centers of galaxies. Finally, high energy radiation provides important information about our own galaxy, neutron stars, supernova remnants and stars like our Sun which emit copious amounts of high-energy radiation. Come and learn about your hot and energetic universe!

Mars: The Ultimate Voyage

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
space exploration	grades 4-8	26 min

On a 2 year journey across space, how will astronauts stay motivated? How will they stay healthy? What challenges will they face along the way? Dive into these questions while finding out what the first journey to Mars might look like - and how creativity, communication, and collaboration come together to ensure safe, deep space travel.

Max Goes to the Moon

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
space exploration	grades K-3	35 min

In this children’s planetarium program, Max (the dog) and a young girl named Tori take the first trip to the Moon since the Apollo era. Along the way, the story sets the stage for the topics including “Phases of the Moon,” “Wings in Space?”, and “Frisbees and Curve Balls on the Moon” - all thoughtfully explained so that grownups and children can learn together about science. Toward the end, Max and Tori’s trip proves so inspiring to people back on Earth that all the nations of the world come together to build a great Moon colony from which “the beautiful views of Earth from the Moon made everyone realize that we all share a small and precious planet.”

Mayan Archaeoastronomy: Observers of the Universe

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Mayan Astronomy	general audiences, grades 4+	20 min

In a feast of colours and sounds, Mayan Archaeoastronomy: Observers of the Universe makes a tour of 6 Mayan temples: San Gervasio, Chichen Itza, Uxmal, Edzna, Palenque and Bonampak where the spectator dives into a Mayan world of knowledge about the importance of the orientations of its temples in relation to the movement of some stars like the Sun, the Moon and Venus.

One World, One Sky

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Basic observation of sky	Pre-K to Grade 2	24 min

Elmo and Big Bird live in the United States and Hu Hu Zhu lives far away in China, but they discovered that they still see the same stars at night! The word for star in Chinese is “xing xing” (pronounced sing sing). How many “xing xing” do you see in this sky? When Elmo and Hu Hu Zhu “travel” to the moon, they discover some basic but surprising scientific facts. For example, they can’t fly a kite there because there is no wind. The fuzzy friends then excitedly realize that children like to fly kites in both China and the United States!

Out There: The Quest for Extrasolar Worlds

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Astronomers, Exoplanets	general audiences, grades 4+	30 min

Out There - The Quest for Extrasolar Worlds will transport viewers from this world to entirely new and foreign ones. The show features the primitive science fiction of early civilisations, to the future space missions that will observe the Universe in greater-than-ever detail and travel to the surfaces and oceans of moons in our Solar System.

Phantom of the Universe: The Hunt for Dark Matter

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Dark Matter	general audiences, grades 7+	38 min

Phantom of the Universe is an exciting exploration of dark matter, from the Big Bang to its anticipated discovery at the Large Hadron Collider. The show reveals the first hints of its existence through the eyes of Fritz Zwicky, the scientist who coined the term “dark matter.” It describes the astral choreography witnessed by Vera Rubin in the Andromeda galaxy and then plummets deep underground to see the most sensitive dark matter detector on Earth, housed in a former gold mine. From there, it journeys across space and time to the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, speeding alongside particles before they collide in visually stunning explosions of light and sound, while learning how scientists around the world are collaborating to track down the constituents of dark matter.

Rusty Rocket’s Last Blast

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Solar System	general audiences, grades 4-7	40 min

After decades of teaching the basics of rocket physics, Rusty Rocket has decided this will be his last blast, and he already has plans for how he will spend his free time. Still there is one final mission to command: an introductory tour of the solar system for a new class of rocket rookies focusing on the wide variety of planetary environments. Along the way, we learn Rusty is related to every famous spacecraft to explore the solar system. He also emphasizes the immense distances between the planets using cars and jets for comparison.

Seeing!

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Vision	general audiences	22 min

Ride a photon across the galaxy to your mind’s eye and experience how we see. “SEEING!” follows a photon’s creation and journey across the galaxy to a young stargazer’s eye. The viewer follows the photon into the girl’s eye, learning the structures of the eye and their functions, prior to taking a ride on the optic nerve. SEEING is a 22-minute full-immersion planetarium program, which will use hemispheric 2D and 3D animations and video to teach how human vision works. Imagery from all over the world including humanity, landscapes, skyscapes, wildlife and of space are the backdrop for photo-realistic animations, which are used to create a story of a photon’s’ journey through the eye and its conversion to an electrochemical impulse that then travels the neuro pathways of the brain to the various centers that create the image the brain sees.

Skywatchers of Africa

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Earth, space science, astronomy, cultures	general audiences, grades 5+	35 min

For thousands of years, Africans have used their knowledge of the sky to build their societies, shape their spiritual lives, and meet their physical needs for survival. Skywatchers of Africa highlights the diversity of African astronomy, examines cultural uses of the sky that developed throughout history, and celebrates our shared human experience.

Solar Quest

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Sun, space science, astronomy	general audiences, grades 5+	12 min

“Solar Quest” is a short feature that demonstrates how the Sun and Earth are interconnected and that we are “Living with a Star”. High quality animations display solar phenomena such as fusion and light energy as well as solar surface features and events. Granules, solar flares and coronal mass ejections are highlighted. The show discusses the impacts of space weather and how the Earth’s atmosphere and magnetic field protects all life on Earth.

The Sun, Our Living Star

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Sun, astronomy, physics	general audiences, grades 5+	24 min

The Sun has shone on our world for four and a half billion years. The light that warms our skin today has been felt by every person who has ever lived. It is our nearest star and our planet’s powerhouse, the source of the energy that drives our winds, our weather and all life.

The passage of the Sun’s fiery disc across the sky - day by day, month by month - was the only way to keep track of time for countless past civilizations. Don’t be fooled by the terminology; although it is a typical dwarf star, the Sun consumes 600 million tons of hydrogen each second and is 500 times as massive as all the planets combined.

Sunstruck

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
Sun, astronomy, physics	general audiences, grades 5+	21 min

Discover the wonders of our Sun. Its incredible energy has supported life on Earth for millennia, but is now threatening our technology and way of life. Travel to the distant future to discover our Sun’s connection to the universe’s cosmic cycle of life and death in Sunstruck.

The Planets

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
space science, solar system	general audiences, grades 4+	36 min

Join us for a grand voyage across the solar system. This is an exciting tour of the Solar System that looks at each planet as well as Solar System formation and extrasolar planets. The program is narrated by Kate Mulgrew (of Star Trek: Voyager).

Two Small Pieces of Glass

TOPIC	AUDIENCE	LENGTH
telescopes, astronomy, physics	general audiences, grades 5+	23 min

While attending a local star party, two teenage students learn how the telescope has helped us understand our place in space and how telescopes continue to expand our understanding of the Universe.

For more information on events, scheduling a private party star watch, directions to the observing site, or for general Society information please contact us at info@astroyork.com or leave a voice message after the recording at 717 759-9227 or visit our Facebook page