Shari Rudavsky

shari.rudavsky@indystar.com

Tickets to hear Neil deGrasse Tyson speak next month at University of Indianapolis disappeared in a nanosecond.

OK, so it might not have been quite that short, but within just a few minutes of making the 2,000 or so free tickets available, they were gone, said Scott Hall, spokesman for the university. Tickets were restricted to two per customer.

Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium at New York's American Museum of Natural History and host of the updated version of the television science series "Cosmos," will speak at 7 p.m. Oct. 22 as part of the university's Blanche E. Penrod Lecture Series.

The event will be held in Nicoson Hall, the university's basketball arena. The university moved it from a smaller venue when it realized how popular the event would be.

University students, faculty and staff had first crack at the tickets, which were made available to the public at 11 a.m. today.

Seating is general admission, and everyone with a ticket must be seated by 6:45 p.m. Any unclaimed seats will be filled on a first-come, first served based.

Those who wish to hear Tyson speak but do not have tickets will be invited to watch a live video feed in UIndy Hall in the Schwitzer Student Center.

Call Star reporter Shari Rudavsky at (317) 444-6354. Follow her on Twitter: @srudavsky.