SINGAPORE — A team of Singaporean university students recently achieved third place in an international rocket-building competition held earlier this June.

This remarkable achievement marks the first time that a Singaporean student group has successfully launched and recovered a rocket designed entirely by themselves.

The Friends of Amateur Rocketry competition is an event organized by a non-profit group Friends of Amateur Rocketry (FAR) organization, held in the Mojave Dessert at the FAR rocketry range near Edwards Air Force Base in California, United States.

The team representing Singapore, “The Singapore Propulsion Lab”, comprised of members from Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (SEDS) Singapore, dedicated tireless efforts on 2 and 3 June to assemble a new rocket for launch on 4 June, the competition’s final day.

On Wednesday (14 June), SEDS Singapore joyfully shared the news of their accomplishment on their official Instagram account.

They expressed their immense pride in these talented Singaporean students and how far they have progressed with their inaugural rocket project.

The team members comprised eight students from the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD), the National University of Singapore, and Nanyang Technological University (NTU).

45 university students and graduates dedicated approximately three years to the rocket project, and raised over $30,000 for the construction and testing of the rocket, with funding from the Office for Space Technology and Industry.

Additionally, the Singaporean rocket and space launch company, Equatorial Space, offered lab space, assistance with hardware selection, and guidance in launch procedures.

California State Polytechnic University, Pomona came in first place in the competition, followed by the National Cheng Kung University in Taiwan.

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A post shared by SEDS Singapore Rocketry Club (@sedssg.rocketry)

Significant challenges prior to their achievement

However, the team faced significant challenges prior to their victorious achievement. Critical components of their rocket, including the engine, were unexpectedly delayed at the United States Customs, due to an administrative conflict with the courier.

At the eleventh hour, they were on the verge of withdrawing from the contest.

As reported by the Straits Times, while the students were already at the site to assemble the rocket, to their dismay, the very heart of their rocket—and the lower airframe was held up at the custom.

Determined to find a solution, the team’s leader, Mr. Dhruv Mittal, 25, hastily made his way to Los Angeles International Airport, while the rest of the team scrambled to devise a backup plan.

At the rocketry site in the US, the team members managed to salvage parts from an old rocket to serve as an airframe. They also procured a conventional solid-fuel motor with the help of the competition organizers.

This posed a challenge as they had primarily been working with hybrid engines. They needed to adapt to the new components, construct an igniter for the rocket, and acquire suitable ground-support equipment for solid-fuel engines.

Furthermore, the team members arrived in the US already physically drained, having juggled demanding schoolwork and intense preparations for the competition, adding the arid and chilly desert climate exacerbated their fatigue.

During the competition, half of the team members fell ill, further hampering their efforts.

On 4 June, when the team’s completed rocket was finally raised onto the launchpad, Mr. Mittal harbored concerns that it might fail to ignite.

With little expectation, the team cautiously positioned themselves behind the safety bunkers and initiated the launch.

To their astonishment, the slender red-and-white rocket, dubbed Project Mynah, soared to an altitude of approximately 3.2km, successfully reaching the competition’s target elevation.

“It was surprising to us that we reached the altitude. We were already mind-blown by the fact that the rocket even flew straight,” said Mr. Mittal. “We were shocked because we rigged something last minute. We changed the rocket’s entire flight profile.”

The team plans to build a more advanced rocket for the 2024 Spaceport America Cup

Due to restrictions on the use of gunpowder and pyrotechnics in Singapore, the team was compelled to switch to carbon dioxide canisters as a means to deploy the rocket’s parachute for landing.

Furthermore, Singapore lacks a dedicated launch site, prompting the team to conduct motor tests at a propulsion lab in Malaysia.

Looking ahead, the team has set its sights on the 2024 Spaceport America Cup, where they intend to construct an even more advanced rocket.

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PARIS, FRANCE — Scientists suffering insults and mass spam are abandoning Twitter for alternative social networks as hostile climate-change denialism surges on the platform following Elon Musk’s takeover.

Researchers have documented an explosion of hate and misinformation on Twitter since the Tesla billionaire took over in October 2022 — and now experts say communicating about climate science on the social network on which many of them rely is getting harder.

Policies aimed at curbing the deadly effects of climate change are accelerating, prompting a rise in what experts identify as organised resistance by opponents of climate reform.

Peter Gleick, a climate and water specialist with nearly 99,000 followers, announced on 21 May he would no longer post on the platform because it was amplifying racism and sexism.

While he is accustomed to “offensive, personal, ad hominem attacks, up to and including direct physical threats”, he told AFP, “in the past few months, since the takeover and changes at Twitter, the amount, vituperativeness, and intensity of abuse has skyrocketed”.

Climate tweets decline

Robert Rohde, a physicist and lead scientist at the non-profit environmental data analysis group Berkeley Earth, analysed activity on hundreds of accounts of widely followed specialists posting about climate science before and after the takeover.

He found climate scientists’ tweets were losing impact. The average number of likes they received was down 38 per cent and average retweets fell 40 per cent.

Twitter has not commented directly about what changes it has made to the algorithms that drive traffic and visibility.

Contacted at its email address for comment, its press department returned its now customary reply, an automated email with a “poop” emoji.

But in a tweet seen as an acknowledgement of a deliberate change, Musk wrote in January: “People on the right should see more ‘left-wing’ stuff and people on the left should see more ‘right-wing’ stuff. But you can just block it if you want to stay in an echo chamber.”

Climate denial bots

In another analysis, prominent climatologist Katharine Hayhoe monitored responses to a tweet on climate change which she published twice, as an experiment, on separate dates before and after the takeover.

She counted the hostile comments and examined them for signs that they came from bots -– automated accounts that researchers say are pushing mass misinformation.

Inauthentic accounts can be identified by analysis tools such as Bot Sentinel.

Replies from apparent trolls or bots increased 15 to 30 times over a two-month period compared to the previous two years, Hayhoe tweeted in January 2023.

“Before October, my account was growing steadily at a rate of at least several thousand new followers a month. Since then, it has not changed,” she told AFP.

Scientists leaving Twitter

Andrew Dessler, professor of atmospheric sciences at Texas A&M University, said he was moving most of his climate communication to Substack, a newsletter platform.

“Climate communications on Twitter are less useful (now) given that I can see that my tweets are getting less engagement,” he said.

“In response to almost any tweet concerning climate change, I find my notifications inundated with replies from verified accounts making misleading or misguided claims.”

Others have abandoned Twitter altogether.

Hayhoe said that of a Twitter list of 3,000 climate scientists that she keeps, 100 disappeared after the takeover.

Glaciologist Ruth Mottram had more than 10,000 followers on Twitter but left in February and joined an alternative scientists’ forum powered by Mastodon -– a crowdfunded, decentralised grouping of social networks founded in 2016.

“It’s really been a revelation in many ways. It’s a much quieter and more thoughtful platform,” she told AFP.

On Mastodon, “I haven’t had any abuse at all or even people questioning climate change. I think we’d become far too used to it on Twitter… I had blocked loads of accounts over on the bird site (Twitter),” she said.

‘Organised’ campaign

Michael Mann, a prominent climate scientist at the University of Pennsylvania and a regular target for abuse by deniers of climate change, said he believed the rise in misinformation was “organised and orchestrated” by opponents of climate reforms.

“I’ve seen a huge rise in trolls and bots. Many target tweets of mine for the attack,” he said.

Mann’s 2021 book “The New Climate War” documented actions by oil producers to sow climate denialism on social media.

“The professional trolls manipulate the online environment with strategic posts that generate conflict and division, leading to a feeding frenzy,” he told AFP.

— AFP