TAMPA, Fla.—Six-year-old Allison Morales Santiz dropped her jaw as she stepped into the newly opened MOSI Digital Dome Theatre, where the screen ahead showed a broad image of the Earth and the International Space Station floating miles above it.
“I feel dizzy,” she said.
The tiny first grader from Forrest Hills Elementary School in Tampa was among the first kids to attend the first field trip at the Museum of Science and Industry’s former IMAX theater on Monday. It has been converted into a domed planetarium with a 10,000-square-foot curved screen, making it the second largest planetarium in the nation.
Pinellas County’s own astronaut Nicole Stott, who spent three months on board the International Space Station and served on the crew for the final mission of the Space Shuttle Discovery, cut the ribbon and introduced the kids to what they were about to experience.
“When you are in space you don’t just see it, you are surrounded by it. You feel it,” said Stott, a graduate of Clearwater High who works often with MOSI on their science education initiatives. “That’s what you are going to get a taste of.”
Hundreds of kids from several Hillsborough County schools settled in, some tilting their necks back to take in a screen that is two stories tall and eight stories wide.
A squeal rose from the crowd as the lights went out and the screen showed the night as it appears in Tampa. An announcer pointed out Jupiter and Mars and Orion’s Belt, easily seen in the current southwest sky without the light pollution that can make such a sight difficult.
The 360-degree view of the cosmos then rushed forward, and kids raised their hands in the air as if to catch the meteors whizzing by. That was followed by the movie “Oasis in Space.”
A view of Saturn as the camera tours each planet in our solar system during the “Oasis in Space” movie at MOSI, Museum of Science and Industry, on Monday in Tampa. Now the second-largest planetarium it has 8K technology for super sharp images.
The popular planetarium show uses high-tech graphics to show the Earth as it used to be and the neighboring planets as they are today. The kids in Monday’s audience screeched and squealed like they were on a rollercoaster as the camera zoomed across the solar system.
The old IMAX theater’s screen has been replaced by a high-tech porous metal NanoSeam screen that shows super-sharp images while sound is pumped from all around.
That sharp image is powered by 10 huge digital Christie projectors that have 8K technology, creating a brighter movie experience than has ever been seen in the Tampa Bay area, MOSI leaders said. And the theater that previously sat 46 people can now seat more than 300.
The old IMAX theater’s screen in MOSI’s iconic blue dome building has been replaced by a high-tech porous metal NanoSeam screen that shows super-sharp images across the second-largest planetarium in America.
The museum spent $4 million on the new technology and facilities and expects to spend up to $10 million over the next few years adding more facilities to the iconic blue dome building, such as new learning labs and dining options.
MOSI will offer star shows, tours of the night sky where you can see the constellations and zoom in with new images made available from the James Webb Space Telescope or Hubble Space Telescope images, enhanced by computer graphics.
The Digital Dome Theatre is now open and will have five shows per day. One show is included with admission, and it is $5 if you want to see more shows on your visit.
If You Go
MOSI Digital Dome TheatreMOSI is open daily 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is $20, $15 for age 3-17. One planetarium show in the Digital Dome Theatre is included, and it’s $5 for any additional shows. 4801 E. Fowler Ave., Tampa, Florida
