The Tsiolkovsky interstellar spacecraft entered the new solar system long ago and the crews of the reconnaissance ships were preparing to explore new planets, while an active discussion was unfolding between the pilots in the control center. The pilots could not understand at what altitude the Karman Line passes for a given planet, which was important for planning the landing mission.
“Karman's line, characteristic velocity, Hohmann's trajectory, specific impulse - all these technical terms easily participated in the discussion. It was obvious that everyone understood what was being discussed and easily used in conversation.
I stood by and listened to this dialogue with poorly articulated feelings. After all, it did not take place in the future or on the pages of a science fiction novel, but in Moscow in 2020, at the Summer Space School.
It so happened that for the first time I participated in the summer space school. At the same time, as they explained to me, this was the first school of a new format, which, if successful, would become the basis of all subsequent schools.
As the main task of this school, an extremely difficult goal was initially chosen - to simulate interstellar flight, from the ballistics of a ship's flight with the entrance to a new system, to a detailed study of previously unknown planets. Why did we need specialists who understand celestial mechanics, the dynamics of spacecraft flight, who can distinguish different types of exoplanets and analyze spectra. Since the knowledge is too complex and specific, not included in the basic course, they need to be given to them. To give lectures, to practice practice on test flights even before the crews are assigned to an interstellar spacecraft. And all this had to be done in the nine days that were allotted to the school. Even in seven, since the first and last days were enlightened for more registration and summary.
The task is really very difficult. Several people at the beginning of the school told me that the workload was very high and even expressed doubts that they would be able to do everything. Moreover, in addition to ballistics and astrophysics, a medical and biological component has also been added.
And from my own experience I can say (as a person who attended almost all lectures) the load was high. Moreover, I already knew a greater percentage of the information. But the brain at first skidded, tried to object, nevertheless, it turned out to be the right load. Since in practice, a confident consolidation of the received materials began. An example can be just the dialogue from the beginning of the article, in which schoolchildren and students have hardly thought that they are using very specific terminology. Knowledge passed into quality, and they already needed this terminology to work and to explain their position. An even more amusing situation arose on the last day of school at a lecture by Boris Stern. Of course, the audience is unlikely to know more about astrophysics than Boris Evgenievich, but the audience was already sitting in front of him, who knew more about exoplanets than he tried to tell them.Several specialized lectures and hard practical work did the trick.
If it was difficult in the lectures, then I can't even imagine how difficult it was to prepare this school. To be honest, I didn't even expect such a high level of lectures. Many lectures were delivered not just by popularizers of science, but by real practitioners from departmental institutes: the Institute of Astronomy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Space Research, the Institute of Biomedical Problems - all provided their lecturers. It was really interesting to listen to them.
It was also interesting to listen to the practitioners in technology. For example, specialists from Sputniks or AltegroSky. Actually, in my opinion, such a meeting with representatives of private astronautics was the most controversial. The projects were presented at too different levels - but interesting at the same time.
In addition, excursions to departmental museums of space industry enterprises were provided: RSC Energia, State Scientific and Research Center named after Khrunichev, the Cosmonaut Training Center and the Institute for Space Research. All these museums are conditionally open to the public. You cannot simply buy a ticket without prior paper correspondence.
At the RSC Energia Museum
Centrifuge TsF-18 at the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center
Still very difficult work was done on the main theme of the school. After all, a new and complex planetary system was prepared, with previously unknown planets, moreover, in strict accordance with the current ideas about the formation of systems. You can't do that kind of work overnight.
The question arises, what is the actual meaning of this event for the organizers? It was obvious that there was little commercial interest in this. The money collected from the school participants did not cover the costs of the organization.
I asked this question to the organizers of the lecture. They explained to me that when there is a large baggage of knowledge, interesting knowledge behind them, it is sometimes very offensive when it cannot be applied or at least passed on to others. For which a non-profit organization was organized. And most of the money that goes to the school comes from private sponsors who are also interested in astronautics.
That is, the idea is successful, the organization also succeeded. But what about the school's visitors, who is it targeting? To be honest, the answer to this question surprised me too. I can't even remember who I expected to see among the “schoolchildren” of this school. But in reality, I saw representatives of the most different professions: there were both humanitarians and active employees of the rocket and space enterprises of our country. They specially enrolled in this school in order to get a real idea of space ballistics. As it turned out, this is one of the problems of the industry. There are a lot of contractors and subcontractors in it who make real devices for real spacecraft, but the head developer issues a fairly general technical specification for the devices, and in order to better understand, you need to present in detail the features of the devices. It takes practicewhich is difficult to obtain, especially if the created device is the first in the series. So the summer space school has become a similar practice. So, most likely, there is already a real benefit from it for our space program.
A funny situation turned out to be with the humanities. It turned out that they were not bored either, moreover, they took an active part in such a complex topic as planetary spectroscopy, in addition, they turned out to be the majority of them. There was even a joke about how many humanities it takes to understand the spectrum of an exoplanet? A team of three has already successfully coped with this task and it was really interesting for them. You should have seen with what enthusiasm the representative of the calculation group talked about how the planets were discovered and how beautiful and interesting they were. You can add that after the start of school, there was no longer a difference what was written in the participant's diploma - a tailor, or a designer of rocketry ...
So, in reality, it was a very interesting experience for me and combat training of a new format for project leaders. And once again I want to thank the organizers for the opportunity to participate in such an interesting project and wish them good luck.