Back to Earth

I said I won't conclude my SSP14 because it's only stage in my overall journey, I would like to mention some things that did since it ended and some things that I plan on doing in the near future in order of using the momentum I've gained. It is also important to mention and thank the Israeli Space Agency Ilan Ramon foundation and the ISU that helped me find the resources to get to the SSP in Montreal.

Now to business, I am now more then ever motivated to keep on working on space related projects, from teaching space, through developing space technologies and researching space both near and far, to pursuing the childhood dream of space travel.

After leaving Montreal, I spent a week at my older brother's house in Ann Arbor, Michigan. I relaxed, wrote some blog entries, played with my nephew and even has some meetings in the University of Michigan's Aerospace department.

My nephew Amitati, and me at the Ann Arbor Hand-On Museum 

After Ann Arbor I returned to Israel for the real de-orbiting. A process that makes a person think about what he/she has achieved and where they want to go. For me, for the near future I have to prioritise some of the ideas and concepts that the SSP had me thinking about. The three things I feel I need to do for the time being (before I start looking for exoplanets, counting more supernovae or enlisting to the astronaut core) are written here, if a manage to do them well enough in this following year I can definitely say I'm on the right track.

The Space Generation Advisory Council (SGAC) is something sometime I learned about during the SSP. The description on the SGAC website specifies that “The Space Generation Advisory Council is a global non-governmental organization and network which aims to represent university students and young space professionals to the United Nations, space agencies, industry, and academia”. Membership in the SGAC is free and it only requires its members to be students or young professionals under the age of 35 working in the space sector. The SGAC connects its members in the local, national and international levels with activities done year round such as online discussions, local meetings and international events held in different locations around the world. The Space Generation Congress (SGC) is one of the major events held by the SGAC it is held for three days every year in the week prior to the International Astronautical Congress (IAC) in September-October. More than 130 SGAC members participate in the SGC every year; they have discussions and panels on space related issues and then produce papers and recommendations that are then presented in the IAC and other events around the world. In addition the SGC includes several networking events meant on creating international and local connections within the space generation. This year (2014) the IAC and SGC are held in Toronto, Canada, and next year they are planned to be in Jerusalem, Israel.
When hearing about the SGAC I have also learned that Israel did not have an official representation (called National Point of Contact (NPoC)) for a while now and that the Israeli SGAC member community is very small and not active.
After learning more about the SGAC, and after realizing that it's important to have a good human infrastructure to help organize the 2015 SGC (all done by volunteers) I decided to nominate myself to be NPoC for Israel. Given that I was a single contender I got both first place and last, and as of  August 20th I am the official SGAC NPoC in Israel. With great help from Ofer Lapid I have been able to get sponsorship from Michael Potter (which I am very very thankful for) to go to the SGC in Toronto (and all this after his help with sending me and my friends to the SSP). I will be going there in order of meeting the people that make the SGAC and in order of learning more about the SGAC and SGC. It will a be a short re-orbit of a few days that will hopefully help me bring some more of the space experience back home. When I come back to Israel I will work on  building a large and active SGAC community that will participate in representing our generation to policy makers in government, industry and academia around the world.

My official appointment as the SGAC NPoC in Israel

Another project I want to advance in the near future is the work done by my high school student group on the Israeli QB50 satellite Hoopoe. We are planned to work on the satellite's structure and hope to manage some work on the satellite's orbit, all this while building a ground station in our science education center in Yeruham.

Last, but definitely not least is my MSc work in satellite control. I hope to take this coming year and make it as fruitful as possible in my studies and research. The SSP has made me even more enthusiastic about space, but I know that only through my research and work I can truly contribute to the space sector and the global community.

One small blast from the not to far away past, out 3.5 hour Mars rover mission has been turn into a 3:52 minute YouTube clip, I drove the rover for team Alpha. -

A recording of the Mars analogue mission that I participated in in the
Space Sciences Department, I drove the rover for team Alpha.

I stated with a Laika photo, should I should end with one, it doesn't seem like she missed me too much, but I was told that every time a car alarm locking beep that sounded like my car went off she run to the door waiting for me to come.