Denel engineer to conduct research in Antarctica

Lumka Msibi

Lumka, who has an engineering degree from the School of Mechanical, Industrial and Aeronautical Engineering at the University of the Witwatersrand, served an internship at Denel Dynamics during the past year.

Denel Dynamics is a division of the Denel group responsible for tactical missiles, guided-weapons and unmanned aerial vehicles and recently expanded into space science with the incorporation of the satellite engineering company, Spaceteq.

Space science projects

Lumka volunteered to be part of the exciting mission into the icy southern waters following an advertisement placed by the SA National Space Agency (SANSA). The agency is conducting a number of space science and weather-related projects in Antarctica as well as Marion and Gough Islands.

As part of the take-over team she will assist in the installing of the Super Dual Auroral Radar Network (SuperDARN) radar at SANAE IV. This is a high frequency digital radar which was built by SANSA space science engineers. The radar system is part of the SuperDARN, an international network of over 30 radars used to monitor the dynamics of space weather.

In addition, she will participate in launching high-altitude balloons as part of a project funded by US space agency, NASA, called the Balloon Array for Radiation belt Relativistic Electron Losses (BARREL) project. Such research is vital in understanding space weather conditions that affect satellites orbiting the earth within the Van Allen Radiation Belts.