Kuwaitis are keen on space know-how, says NASA expert
‘Difficult endeavour requires expertise’
KUWAIT CITY, March 8, (KUNA): More and more Kuwaitis are looking to the stars in a quest to create the foundations for space exploration. But the difficult endeavour requires expertise from more experienced nations in the field.
Through meetings with Kuwaiti researchers and youngsters, a leading NASA engineer said she had witnessed an “organic interest” in US space technology and research.
This cooperation could be through helping young Kuwaitis learn about “cube satellites or sounding rockets,” senior NASA engineer Nagin Cox told KUNA at the US Embassy in Kuwait.
Cube satellites, or cube sats as Cox describes, are very small satellites which US universities help students build in order to give them a background on how satellites operate in addition to their functions. When countries ponder plans for space exploration, these are usually the first steps towards that goal, Cox said, adding NASA offers several internships to international students which are scientifically orientated in nature.
The US is not the only country with a space programme, and Cox mentioned the United Arab Emirates’ plans to send its own spacecraft to Mars in 2021, which will monitor conditions on the Red Planet, said to have the closest conditions to Earth in the Solar System.
Meanwhile, she said that current cooperation currently exists between NASA and Kuwait Foundation for the Advancement of Sciences (KFAS) on a satellite observation of Earth’s surface.
Measure
KFAS is conducting the “calibration and validation of data” from a NASA satellite, called SMAP, or Soil Moisture Active Passive, which is an observatory that has been placed in a polar orbit around Earth designed to measure the planet’s soil moisture over a three-year period.
During her weeklong stay which began on Sunday, the engineer held public talks at two public schools and several universities describing her current research role on the space agency’s Mars robotics exploratory Rover vehicles mission.
She has also met several public and private research and academic institution representatives, such as KFAS, Kuwait University, Kuwait College of Science and Technology and the College of Aviation Technology.
Following in line with several leading speakers invited by the US Embassy, the engineer said she hoped her visit would inspire more students to get involved in science, technology engineering and maths.
Cox also said she was “very impressed” by the level of scientific convergence between the local engineering community, as well as the numbers of women involved in scientific research in Kuwait.
For his part, US Ambassador Lawrence R. Silverman revealed that cooperation was in the pipeline on the terrestrial mapping of Kuwait between Kuwait’s Environment Protection Agency (EPA) and the United States Geological Survey, USGS.
The USGS is a government research agency dedicated to the study of matters such as the Earth’s natural resources, meteorological movements, ecosystems and water.
The cooperation, which will involve the dispatch of a several UGS researchers to Kuwait in two months, will help local scientists understand their environment better, including how to deal with tough climatic conditions like sandstorms and drought.
In the meantime, through Cox’s visit, the US government hopes to encourage cooperation with Kuwait, specifically on scientific and technological research, particularly after His Highness the Amir’s signature of an agreement in this regard, the ambassador added.
MoU
During his visit to Washington in September last year where he met President Donald Trump, His Highness the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber AlSabah signed a memorandum of understanding with US officials, which included cooperation on research and educational aspects.
“Part of what she (Cox) is doing is connecting with people and other researchers, who have an interest in space.
“You never know who the next astronaut is going to be, you never know who the next researcher is going to be,” said Silverman, “you need to give them that inspiration when they’re younger.” Young Kuwaitis today have a strong desire to learn about aviation, said Marzouq Al-Shareefi, the Vice Dean of the Kuwait-based College of Aviation Technology, which hosts over 500 students.
The American expert’s visit to Kuwait is a “benefit for us in the aviation sector,” he said after Cox earlier toured the academic institution and expressed a “good opportunity” for cooperation with NASA.
The Kuwaiti college, which possesses three small-sized Cessna and one large Gulfstream aircraft, all manufactured by the US, could benefit from US academic expertise, through lectures from experts, or through purchasing equipment, he added.
Nasser Ashkanani hopes to one day send a cube satellite he and another seven Kuwaitis, including physicists and teachers who call themselves the ‘Kuwaiti Suborbital Rocket Propulsion Group’, have successfully designed.
The group have created the blueprints — a 3D model design — for the goal, the 23-year-old told KUNA, and now require funding worth an estimated KD 100,000 ($334,000), and necessary government permission to launch the project.