PP2 Skype the European Space Agency

On Friday PP2 had the chance to talk to Kim Nergaard via Skype. He is a rocket scientist who works for the European Space Agency and is Head of Advanced Mission Concepts. He told the class about his job which includes designing Eurobot, a robot which can be controlled from space. British astronaut Tim Peake, who will be going to the International Space Station in November, will be one of the astronauts trialling this new technology. PP2 were able to ask lots of interesting questions like ‘How far into space have we explored?’ and were surprised to find that ESA has been beyond our solar system. They also found out about Rosetta and what it has told us about Comet 67. We now know that comets are not spherical and that the water on comets is different from water on Earth. There was only one question which couldn’t be answered which is ‘Where does space end?’ No one knows the answer yet! Being able to interview a real life scientist has inspired PP2 to design space craft (This takes about ten years) and to aspire to work in space (ESA picks 10 astronauts each year out of 20,000 applicants!) PP2 love learning about space!