It’s Father’s Day on Sunday in a good chunk or the world. Make that everywhere – except for Australia and New Zealand where it’s in mid-September. And answering the question as to why that is will probably make an interesting blog post somewhere I’m sure.
We’re actually running a SentForever “Send a Message for Father’s Day” promotion with a number of newspapers around the world, where readers can send a message to “Eternalise your Dad on Father’s Day”.
I’m sure dads will find the technical aspects of the SentForever service more interesting than mum’s so here’s a bit for them.
SentForever use a specially dedicated transmitter at BT’s Goonhilly earth station in Cornwall, UK for all our message into space transmissions. Using powerful radio waves which travel at the speed of light in space, the SentForever messages travel at about 671 million miles per hour.
Upon transmission, in the blink of an eye, the eternal messages are passing 450 miles above the French Mediterranean coast. They leave our solar system around 5 hours later, and if transmitted in the direction of Alpha Centauri (the nearest star other than our own sun), they will arrive in just over 4.2 years. And all the messages that we send continue to travel for the rest of eternity too.
So, the newspaper readers will be sending their dads a rather unique Father’s Day gift this year – I hope they’ve been good!
If you’d like SentForever to transmit an unusual Father’s Day gift or message for your dad this year let us know. If we find it interesting and we are able to do it, then we will arrange a special free transmission for you as a thank you for your suggestion.
By Chris Thomason
Posted by eternalmessage 