Features editor
It’s been a good week for marvelling at human capability. I’m sure most readers are as glued as we are to the Olympics, where the amazing athletes are testing the limits of the human body and spirit. And we’ve also had a dramatic demonstration of human ingenuity, with the successful landing of MSL-Curiosity, NASA’s car-sized Mars rover, thanks to to the inventiveness of JPL’s Adam Steltzner and his entry, descent and landing team, who conceived, designed and built the Skycrane system.
It’s not often that I run out of superlatives after the first paragraph, but it’s been that sort of week.
One technological feat has been pretty much overshadowed by the news of sport and planetary science. It might seem quite routine, but for millions of people it will be momentous. Last Thursday, in a routine launch from the Kourou Space Centre in French Guiana, an Ariane 5 rocket put a communications satellite called Hylas 2 into orbit. Part of a family of adaptable satellites owned by London-based Avanti Communications, Hylas 2 will help bring broadband internet connectivity to central Asia, the Middle East and southern and eastern Africa, including some of the most isolated rural communities in countries like Angola and Namibia.

Internet connectivity is becoming increasingly important in the developing world. Generally accessed using mobile devices, it’s used by farmers and fishermen to find the markets that will pay the best prices for their produce; increasingly, it’s giving information about clean water and healthcare, both for the locals and for the service providers. Add this to the everyday uses of just allowing people to stay in touch with each other, and it adds up to a raft of ways to improve standards of living, reduce poverty and generally ease conditions in some of the toughest places to live on the planet.
We take technology like the internet so much for granted in the UK that it’s sometimes easy to forget how revolutionary it is. Perhaps that’s why some people look askance at, for example, India’s space programme: how can a country with so much poverty indulge in such luxury? But much of the space programme in India is directed towards projects like Hylas 2, which are improving communications around that vast country and helping to allieviate that poverty.

Looking at it that way, perhaps the most significant part of last weekend’s Olympic opening ceremony was the point where a modest-looking, sandy-haired man was revealed sitting at a desk in the middle of the stadium. Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, the collection of documents, pictures and datasets that we access via the internet, tapped out a message and sent it to the world via Twitter: THIS IS FOR EVERYONE. I suspect that it’s only in the coming decades that we’ll appreciate the true magnitude of his gift.

Finally, a recollection of a giant of British science and technology. A few years ago, I attended an event at Jodrell Bank, to mark the 50th anniversary of the Lovell Telescope; the giant dish first entered service by tracking the progress of the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1. To mark the occasion, Sir Bernard Lovell, the driving force behind radio telescopy who died yesterday, gave a short speech in which he not-so-gently prodded attending politicians about their lack of understanding and support for science and technology, and had a video chat with one of the Russian scientists behind Sputnik; a few months older than Lovell, he touchingly congratulated ‘his young friend’ on his achievements. Lovell, although obviously very frail, made a point of talking to as many of the scientists at the event as he could. He never lost his curiosity and that, as his Russian counterpart said, ensured that he’d always be a young friend.

What sort of speeds do the sateillite internet connections give? My bandwidth was so slow last night it was struggling to stream a radio show whilst loading one other (non graphics-intensive) webpage.
Wireless communications makes so much more sense in places as vast as Africa and Asia, where the cost of fixed line infrastructure would mean most people would be lucky to see a land line telephone.
Coincidently, I was listening to a radio version of a Dorothy L Sayers Lord Peter Wimsey novel last night – and there was question of whether or not the nearest village had a telephone from which the Police could be called. This followed a programme on the use of video conferencing to allow consultants in Cumbria and Lancashire to interview and diagnose stroke victims more quickly on admission. Patient to nearest hospital and consultant in any of the Trust’s hospitals is no longer an issue. What a difference this could make to those served by Hylas 2 and its ilk.
As an undergraduate I had the privilege of meeting Sir Bernard Lovell, and I remember to this day his kindness in explaining, without ever talking down, difficult mathematical concepts in terms that even a snotty-nosed undergrad could understand.
And BTW, the great Lovell telescope turns to this day on a main bearing which came from the gun turret of a battleship which had been scrapped after the war. Lovell’s quiet persistence wore down the MoD until they eventually gave in and let him have it. There’s a lesson for us all in there!
What a shame that one of our truly great men only got to be a Sir, when athletes can become Lords for a few years training. No wonder as a nation our manufacturing base continues to decline. Inspirational figures do so much to foster investment and career paths.
Isn’t it time we had school science fairs like the US does?
What an amazing person Sir Bernard Lovell was. Not only a scientist/Engineer but a person that inspired youngsters to follow in his footsteps. I remember his involvement at my School and his invitation to visit Jodrell Bank – with his own personally guided tour for the class – amazing!
The world was made richer by his life and lessened by his passing – Thank you
I used to attend Science fairs during the 1980’s organised by the Southern Science & Technology Forum, for whom I was a ‘Window Opener’ – talking about engineering in schools. The creativity and inventiveness of the children never ceased to amaze me. With nurturing and not stifling with bureaucracy, we are more than capable of producing more people like Sir Bernard Lovel, Tim Berners-Lee, Isambard Brunel, and all the other greats. we have the talent, not the system to exploit it any more!
Great article – and thanks for ensuring that Hylas 2’s significance didn’t get missed in amongst the Olympics, Mars, Internet, Radio Astronomy…