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In this talk, the moon
and the European space exploration.
We will hear why
we should go back to the moon
after forty four years.
And we are very pleased to have a young
runner as our honored guest
today, this evening, and
he's the current director general of the
European Space Agency.
He's also the former chairman of the
executive board of the German Aerospace
Center, also known as Deflower
and.
You would expect that he would be an
aerospace engineer, but he
started out as a civil engineer
for the Germans Boeing engineer.
He got the Federal Cross of
Merit first class for continuous
engagement for young academics.
And unfortunately, to list all
of his doctorate's would really take
too much time off of his
limited talk time, so please
give it up for young Virna.
Yes, OK, no, no, you have
to be quiet because they did not give me
enough time, so you have to be quiet
and I recommend you to listen and
see and if possible, do
the whole lecture I will give to you in
slow motion afterwards, because otherwise
I cannot do it in 30 minutes.
So what is the return of investment
of space? This is a question I get
nearly every day. I hope not in this
room, but I will answer it anyhow.
And the question is, is return of
investment always just the money?
If you look into our universe, you know,
we have something like galaxies
and the galaxies are rotating.
And according to all our theories,
which we know about Newton and about
gravity, the spirit of
the speed at the outer part should be
slower then in the inner part,
because otherwise the stars would
escape.
But observation showed that the
speed at the outer part is exactly the
same as in the inner part.
And we don't understand this effect.
And therefore we gave it a new name and
we call it dark matter.
So it's not something we we really
see. It's just an effect.
So why I'm talking about this,
because there's another effect which is
called dark matter, dark energy,
dark energy. If you have a
big bang and then the universe is
expanding according to
Joseloff gravity, this velocity,
the acceleration should decrease, the
velocity should decrease.
And finally, it should implode again
and for several billions
of year.
Fortunate enough, the universe
behaved like we thought, but then
it changed and now it's accelerating
again.
We don't know why.
We have no clue about it.
And therefore we call it dark energy.
Dark energy and dark matter is more than
95 percent of our universe.
So it's not a negligible part.
But there are also some aspects even
closer in our solar system.
The scientists said, OK, let's
prove that really Pluto
is the last planet of our solar
system.
Yeah, planet something saying not a
planet.
OK, that's fine.
But no, no, no, no.
Afterwards, afterwards, I have no time.
So so
Pluto, the last, let's say,
Michael planet or something like that.
And they try to prove it with all
this theory. And suddenly they
found there must be another planet.
Nobody ever saw it.
But it seems that there is something
outside of Pluto.
We know the size.
We don't know anything about it.
So all of this is an example of
where we need curiosity.
Curiosity is the strongest driver
we have and we should not forget about
it. Just look to Albert
Einstein. You know, of course, his theory
of relativity.
He has the equation just that you
remember it.
And he said into special theory of
relativity, time is slowing down by
velocity.
And in the general theory of relativity,
time is slowing down by gravity.
What the hell is the return of investment
of this equation?
What is a benefit to society?
If you ask politicians, you will get an
easy answer.
No meaning.
Everything is relative.
This is the best sentence you can get.
So now the question is, is
it really just an academic
idea without any consequence?
If you look to satellite
navigation, we have the satellites flying
around the Earth really fast.
Really fast means there must be
some some
effect on the timing.
And they are far away from the earth.
So the a curvature of the earth is much
lower.
There must be also some effect
on the timing and the satellites.
The navigation satellites are
nothing more than really exact
clocks.
So if these two effects are there,
then there should be an effect also
on our on the navigational system.
And in fact, without knowing
this theory, you would
have a mistake, an error of about
five hundred meters in one hour.
That means let's be curious also
for the future. Even we don't see a
return of investment the next four weeks.
Let's be curious, because this is the
main message out of exploration
we have.
Yeah, no, no, no, no, no, it's OK.
You know, we have, but we have also
concrete aspects, global challenges,
we call them like climate change, like
migration, mobility, communication,
energy charter for resources, you can
read yourself, but there is, again,
this curiosity.
It's a different type of challenge,
but it's the strongest driver which
brought us out of the caves above
the mountains in the next valley.
Even we cross the Atlantic Ocean.
Whether it was an advantage or not, I
don't know. But anyhow, we did it by
that.
And therefore, curiosity is the strongest
driver and the strongest driver is now
part of space.
And what I call Space 4.0 is this
is a new generation of space where we
look into commercialization, but
also in participation with citizens
in digitalization, information,
innovation, interaction, inspiration.
Enteron.
And you see here what we
at ESA are doing, we are covering
all the different aspects, we are looking
to Earth observation, to navigation, to
telecommunication, to science
and exploration, to a new launch
assistance. But also we enter vehicles
to technology operations.
We even look to a space and meteorites.
And we are looking to new technologies
and also to things procurement
with industry. So ESA is the European
Space Agency.
And as we are international with 22
member states within Europe, plus
Slovenia plus Canada,
we are not part of the European Union.
We are trying to be a
global player with all the different
states around the globe.
So we are with our international
nature. We can play together with all the
others as well.
Therefore, ESA is an agency not only,
but it's also a broker mediator, an
enabler for global cooperation in space
and space. For us today is not only
having a satellite and giving some data
to it to the ground, but space
is now something a
source of new information, also
a source of new technologies.
Teflon pan does not come from space, but
as I suspect and we are now using
also earthly technologies in
space. So it's a totally new world, which
we are now covering. And what I said
already is Space 4.0 means
also more participation with people,
not only with politicians, not only with
space agencies.
And we tried this last year, now
this year to really discuss with
different people from different
countries. I will give you only a short
example of that.
What happened? So we did.
Can you do it a little bit louder?
And you can switch off this light from
what is going on, they say the
cosmos, cosmos on Greek
space, the final frontier.
You should know that one from
space. So I could do it for half an
hour, but then I would not be able to
talk about myself.
I would stop it over here.
If you're interested in that, you can see
it in our Internet page.
You can get all of these different
nations and how people are reacting.
So we had more than 2000 participants
from 22 countries at the same
time meeting in the different countries
and discussed with them.
Not only questionnaires are simple things
like that, but really and the debate and
the results were very promising.
I have you only a few of the results.
I don't go to all of this.
I go just to the last one, because
this one I was very surprised about
81 percent said exploit
natural resources from space.
This is a really very difficult
question. Should we really go outside
the earth and get resources back
to Earth so we can discuss about that
whenever you like?
This is a very, very important question
we have to answer. But do you see also
here a universe of possibilities and
opportunities, place to be protected
from polluting and potentially harmful
human activity? So all of this was
said was very high percentage.
So out of this citizen debate, we got
a lot of input.
And therefore, participation is for me a
very important thing.
But now look to exploration.
I said curiosity.
I tried to explain to you why I
believe that exploration is important.
This is the sentence of a philosopher.
It's much better than a civil engineer
can say. We will not cease from
exploration until we come back to where
we came from and sees a place for the
first time. I don't understand it, but I
think it's a very good sentence and
therefore I'm using it.
Water.
Water is something we are using
day by day. Have you ever thought about
water in detail?
Only, not only when you have to go to a
restroom, but if you want to drink
something.
Water is very interesting and water
covers about more than 70 percent of our
earth's surface.
It's transparent, which is not
automatically it's transparent.
There's some anomaly of water,
meaning that you have ice is
lighter than water at about
four degrees.
We have special behavior between
temperature and viscosity.
It's not poisonous.
It's tasteless, it's odorless.
It has a high surface tension.
There's a very special thing.
You can have water with hydrogen
or you can hydrogen Heff with another
neutron. It's a cause.
Then you have deuterium.
You can have two different types of
water, heavy water and
light water. And you have many, many
applications day by day.
But the question is, where is the water
from? Again, people would say, I don't
care. We have 70 percent of the surface.
This is enough for me.
But as a curious
person, I think to ask the question,
where does the water come from?
Is an important question.
And there are the scientists were
discussing about it.
And after long, long discussions, they
said it comes from comets
because comets are frozen material
and therefore they plant a mission called
Rosetta.
You have heard about it to fly to the
comet Jewy, almost Semenko.
It took us ten years to go there
without any maintenance
maintenance in between, no
no oil change or whatever.
Of course, the software was updated a
little bit, but the processor was
more than ten years old at the end.
So it was really an old computer on
board.
And this is an environment which is much
harsher than this nice concrete center.
So therefore, it was really a very
difficult thing.
And finally, we landed
on the comet on the 27th of November,
and this is the selfie.
This is a selfie
I was asked before landing.
What is the probability that you will do
this? And I said, I have no idea because
it's a very first time.
And if you're doing something for the
first time, you don't know about
probability.
In fact, we learned it.
And because of the small gravity,
we were afraid that it will be pushed
back so it and happens to
keep it on the ground.
Unfortunately, this happens did not work.
It has a special engine to keep down.
Unfortunately, this engine did not work,
so it popped up again several
hours, lend it again, hopped again and so
on. So now I can tell you we had more
than three landings and it's perfect.
We can do first statistics of it now.
I will.
I will now I need to
your silence, because I will show you
the noise during the first
landing.
This is it's just a repetition and
I like it very much.
So we
know I have it also in slow motion for
you.
So now this is of course
not. There's no atmosphere.
So it's the sound in the legs.
And the reason we measured this was
in order to get some input about
the quality, about the surface toughness
of this tiny comet.
And by analyzing this noise,
we can directly get some information.
So I mentioned about the water issue.
Now, we looked on this
on this comet
also about water.
And the interesting thing was, yes,
there was water and organic material.
However, the ratio between
heavy water and light water
was totally and is totally different
to the one we have on Earth.
On Earth, it's more or less constant.
This comment has a three times higher
percentage of heavy water.
So the question remains, where
does the water come from?
We don't know, maybe partly from these
type of comets, maybe also from other
comets.
Now, as this is a very important
movie to show a little bit
the different cultures in different
countries.
But we're seeing.
And frankly, I feel take.
This.
So finally, after it landed
and hopped on hopped, we did not
know where it was and we were very lucky
on the 5th of September, we found
it finally over there in a very
shadowed place.
And that was the reason that it did not
could charge, again, its batteries,
but it worked perfectly for the first 60
hours. And this was what we wanted to
reach. And this is the last image of
the main spacecraft, Rosetta, which
also finally touched down on the comet.
So we got some additional information
from the surface coming
close to the surface.
So I mentioned, again, Rosetta, Philae
and the comet.
And these comments are dark as charcoal.
So you need a very special camera to
have an image of it because
it has even more than 50 Shades of gray.
And it has and this camera,
this camera technology was then developed
also to use it on Earth for early fire
detection.
And this is something I can also always
show to people asking for a return of
investment. I say yes, because of this is
everything is fine.
I don't need this proof, but I hope
you understand. Now, we have also human
spaceflight there. And it was mentioned
the Apollo flights to the moon that was
raised in space with
the result.
We all know the Americans winning this
race, but their robotic technologies of
the Soviet Union was also rather
impressive.
And this is the most famous picture.
I'm sure you know, all of you all know
what it's show.
Buzz Aldrin, the second man on the moon.
He was very angry
that he could not be the first one.
And so he always asked Neil Armstrong,
take a photo, take a photo, take a photo.
In this picture you see here, Neil
Armstrong over there in the video.
And this picture was Photoshopped
by NASA.
They were on the moon.
Yes. I asked the NASAA administrator,
have you really been there?
And he said it was much more expensive,
would have been much more expensive to
keep old people silent, and
therefore they were upset.
But this picture is Photoshopped because
Nazar thought above this,
there should be some dark,
dark sky.
And unfortunately, Neil Armstrong
had the picture closed
over here.
So there was something missing
and they finally put some black over
it in order to show there is some sky.
Why do I know that?
Very simply because of this.
Oh, there you
see the antenna is missing over here.
There's no antenna.
And this is the reason it was
Photoshopped. So but
trust me, they were there.
So in 2014,
we had the Crimea crisis, which is still
going on.
And it's very important to see that space
can overcome all of this problems or at
least breach it.
And this is a picture directly after the
Crimea conflict started.
It shows an American
and Russian and European astronaut with
a German accent like me.
It's Oleksander guest.
And they were sitting here and minutes
later they stand in front of the
Soyuz rocket.
This is my hand, by the way.
I hope you believe me.
And here they are now entering this
deal.
You
know the
truth if he does dozen.
So not just that's not good.
OK, then they started
that's marvelous to see that and to feel
it in Russia and Kazakhstan and this
was a place where they are going.
That's the Americans, the Russians, the
Japanese, the Europeans and the Canadians
in the International Space Station.
OK, next on the guest, of course,
did a lot of experiments.
He looked also to us and reported about
that. And a German journal said, this
is not OK. He should not think about
emotions. He should do research.
But I think it's very nice if you show
pictures like that.
It's also nice if you saw if you saw his
pictures like that saying explosions
and bombing on Earth.
It's not something we should do.
I mean, consider an alien flying to
the Earth and see what we are doing.
I'm not so sure whether he or she would
come friendly anyhow.
You see, this is a picture I like
of Guest and then he'll
end it.
And this is what the Russians call a soft
landing
because you have to keep it was a soft
part of your body and you will
see it.
It's it's really
harsh now that
he was in good shape.
And then the question was how to get him
home. And I ask the Americans,
can we not bring him directly to Europe?
And they said, yes, but Kazakhstan, no,
we will fly from Kazakhstan to Scotland.
You can come to Scotland and bring
him to Europe.
I said, fine, but they said, but you have
to have a plane with
intensive care, how to get
intensive care?
I asked the German Air Force.
The minister did not accept that because
the taxpayers would not allow because
of one extra notes that the plane
is flying. So I looked for another one.
And there is a so-called ADAC is the
ultimate backup and they have
planes.
So I called the president of that club
and said, can you bring us
Mr. Gast to
Europe?
And he said, yes, if you allow us
that we publish it in our
monthly journal ADEA to motivate
for the Germans.
And this is one of the most famous
journals. The other one comes from the
pharmacist, Patika.
And so.
So and then he said, I have a final
question, is he a member?
And I could tell yes, yes.
He was brought back
he was brought back to Germany,
in this case to Cologne, but
where are we going in the next case?
There should be no ultimate goal.
Humans are always going farther and
farther. Therefore, I think we should not
talk about an ultimate goal.
The Americans in Asia is the right now
saying let's go to mass.
They say journey to Mars, which means
more than a trip to Mars.
And but to go to Mars with humans is
really difficult.
It takes about two years back
and two to go there and coming
back because of the different
orbits of Moon and Mars.
And you see here some issues.
We have to go to moon.
You can do it during Christmas and
New Year. So instead of going to
hymnbook, you can also go to the moon.
So there are
some companies saying, OK, we just
make a one way trip.
I'm not in favor of that one.
But we are right now with the European
mission to Mars, we are going to
Tomas, but without humans.
So it's this robotic mission.
The first one was launched already and
the second one should be launched in
2020. And one issue is
to look for something like life
because we found methane on Mars.
And the question is, is it from a
biological source or is it from
other sources?
And therefore, we started this mission
and then this was a launch in
Kazakhstan.
And I like this picture very much because
this is the French.
The head of the agency of the Italian
agency is myself Russian space
agency. At that time, he was from the
British Space Agency.
So, again, SpaceX is breaching
all the national problems
and so on so we can do it.
This was the first picture I was really
happy about. That was the spacecraft
flying to towards Mars.
And I was not sure whether it's on the
right direction, but with it I
was sure, OK, we are really
going to Mars.
And then we had this nice picture that
was the idea of
landing on Mars.
So we have two spacecraft.
One is the so-called trace gas orbiter
surrounding and orbiting
Mars, and the other one is the this
test module, which
should enter into the atmosphere with a
heat shield, then with a parachute, then
the heat shield should be separated,
then the
parachute should be separated.
Finally, some engine starts
OK, you know the story.
It was excellent until here
you see everything.
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. OK, we can
forget about that.
The problem was the spacecraft
recognized that it's already
underneath the surface and
then it makes no sense to have any longer
parachutes. So it separated the parachute
and it makes no sense to have a long time
for the engines.
So they stopped all the engines, but
it was still too high.
So we had a little bit harsh landing.
But everything is fine.
We've got good information.
We have a good landing site that's over
here, you see, and we have
not only one, we have several points
because.
Gives a parachute over here.
The heat shield over there and the
LENDA impact over there.
We don't know what that is, but I'm sure.
So this picture
show us now is that Tracy obiter is
really active and this is a more
scientific part of that one.
So we got all the data from the lending
procedure and now we're getting auto data
from the surface and to
trace gas.
Orbital Auto was working as
a relay station, so it worked perfectly.
This was a press Schiaparelli
mask for crashed, making it to failed
landing attempts from. He's a very bit.
Very bit.
We are OK.
You know, another guy, this
is Elon Musk.
This was his third try to land
on a drone ship.
Everything was fine until he
everything was excellent.
But then something was not excellent.
And that was the end
of this rocket.
So now OK, now
the question is, what about the press in
this case? I mean, very similar.
The satellite was in orbit like tgo,
but during landing, something worked.
Not perfectly.
And this is a German newspaper translated
at SpaceX again, was landing to
launch Absolves Crash Lendings.
They are right to
the American side a little bit better.
Falcon nine almost landing.
And and Elon Musk
himself said ship is fine.
Minawi pass exciting day.
Now, what are the goals for the future?
Where to go?
You know, this village, what
is a village in the village?
You have diverse interests, you have
diverse actors, you have diverse
activities, diverse calendars,
but some joint idea to do something.
This is No. One village.
Now, you know what village is now is the
second one is what is a concept?
A concept. There's not a single project.
It's not a fixed end to end plan.
It's not a fully regulated installation.
Bla bla bla bla bla.
But it defines interfaces
when needed, and these two words, village
and concept, these
are now put together in the concept moon
surface operations we are doing
we can do the international activities,
human, robotic, public, private
exploration, pioneering outreach and
steam science, technology,
engineering, math and arts.
And we can do a
moon science.
The moon is not really understood so
far, but we can do a
moon science, we can do cosmology,
especially if you go to the far side of
the moon, which is not the dark side.
Like Pink Floyd, the far side is as
bright as the side on our
side, fundamental research, technology,
transportation, communications,
logistics. We can do research,
management, planetary defense
also and a stepping stone.
And this is therefore, I call it a moon
village with free and open
access to everybody.
No regulation at all.
This is a picture.
And I hope that this community
supports me, that this should be this
astronauts maybe is something
which is also his college coach.
And I will show you.
He already has the right flex.
One village is already in the
public, it is the Americans
are observing us, it is also
the Federal Aviation Administration
officially endorsed this endorsed
this moon village concept.
There are some companies now
arguing that they have the right
architecture. This is a Scandinavian
company.
Some others believe we can use
some can use the moon for
some other aspects.
And you might really witness a
long distance flight, the journey
to Mars. Is it in contradiction?
Not at all, because if you want to go to
Mars, you better make a pit
stop at the Moon Village.
And therefore, I hope
don't be don't keep calm,
but keep active and be a village.
Thank you very much for your attention.
Thank you, Mr. Virna, for this awesome
talk, and I think we have some time left
for two questions, but only
if you keep it very brief.
So first, no comments.
Secondly, a question and maximum
two sentences. Microphone one, please.
OK, brief question.
Yeah. What do you think will
be the first piece of hardware that
stands for the Moon Village on the moon
and maybe when.
Yeah, so it will be a Monday.
Of course, that's easy.
And you see, it's as I said, it's
not a plan that ESA is now doing this
stuff, stuff, stuff.
It is that worldwide we have different
actors. We have in this
part time scientists.
We have Astro Robotics, we have
people from all over the world.
And most of them have some plan either
to go next year or the year after to the
moon. And I'm quite sure it will be some
some stuff. I don't know, maybe it's
scientific. Maybe it's smart to to
to adjust to prove something.
I have no idea. I'm ready.
So from ESA side, we are doing something
together with the Russians.
We call it lunar. We saw this.
We have also a moon project.
But my idea is to have it open
architecture and not I don't want to
decide who comes first and second and so
on. This is the past.
So do we have a question from the
Internet?
Nothing so far.
OK, then, please.
Microphone number three, I
do.
We also work together with India
and China, of course.
You see, the beauty of EESA
is we have 22 member states, plus Canada
plus Slovenia, as I'm always quoting,
saying and saying, and therefore we have
no problem at all to cooperate, which
was different members, different states
around the world. And I think it's
necessary.
Don't forget about values.
Don't forget about things
you don't think are really good.
But cooperation is a must for
citizens on Earth.
So I'm therefore I
say just of course.
So we don't have any more time for
questions now, but have not told
us that he's available, if you have any
questions to him for some
more minutes at least.
So, yeah,
thank you.
If you allow me, it was really great to
be here for the first time.
I think that I was invited.
It was a great honor for me.
And if you like, I come again,
OK?