Flannan’s pupils take on space

Four pupils from St Flannan’s have blasted off to attend the International Space Development Conference in Alabama, USA, this week with the help of locally based company, Microsemi Ireland.

The pupils will present a paper at the conference outlining their designs for a futuristic, self-sufficient space settlement.
Earlier this week CEO and President of the multi-national presented the students with a cheque for €8,000 for the trip, with a pledge to increase that amount to €15,000 next year.
On a visit to Ennis this week, Microsemi CEO Jim Peterson met with pupils Caitlyn Horgan, Bram Siebert, Brendan Golden and Norbert Rosik. He described them as “outstanding” and outlined that the company has a strong involvement with philanthropic investments particularly involving children and education.
“These four students have been working globally with others and they are showing the world what they created,” he said.
This is the the second year in-a-row that the science department in St Flannan’s have sent the students to the conference. It is the third time in over 10 years that an Irish school has presented their work at this prestigious event.
Microsemi Ireland, which is based in the Gort Industrial Estate and are at the forefront in providing products for Aerospace programmes, also provided funding for last year’s trip.
“Space is key market for Microsemi with more and more communication being channelled through an ever-increasing satellite network over our heads. Microsemi components are specially tested at Microsemi Ennis to withstand the harsh environment in space as it grows in this technology driven sector,” said a spokesman for the Ennis facility.
The students, members of the schools science club of which Michael Horgan is the facilitator, entered a competition to design a space settlement colony. They worked as part of an international team called Helios, which is made up of four students from Ireland, one from India, 10 from Japan and five from Florida, USA. The team entered a competition called the NASA/Ames Space Settlement Design Competition. The results of this competition were announced last April 2011. The 20 best and most interesting entrants were selected to present their work at the ISDC. 
The team designed a futuristic space settlement that could eventually house up to 12.5 million people and be self-sufficient in housing, feeding and employing its inhabitants. The settlement has a width of 4km and is powered by solar energy. In fact, the design of the settlement allows it to act like a giant solar dish/panel.