Published: Thursday, 27th November, 2008 11:00
Stellar job for Waingels Girl
By James Kell
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A WOODLEY graduate is reaching for the stars after being snapped up by the European Space Agency.
Former Waingels pupil Victoria Lowe has been given the chance of a lifetime to work with state-of-the-art space technology after completing a masters in aerospace engineering and astronautics.
Victoria, 24, who dreams of becoming an astronaut one day, said: “The area I am working in is spacecraft propulsion. I’ll be working with a very experienced team, designing the systems that help keep satellites orbiting in space and that reposition spacecrafts if they get knocked-off course.”
The Kingston University graduate will explore different aspects of propulsion and will look at ways to launch rockets during the course of her one-year placement at the European Space Research and Technology Centre in Noordwijk, Holland.
Victoria said: “I’ve always been fascinated by the solar system and knew I wanted to be involved with space exploration in some way.
“I opted for the foundation engineering course at Kingston because it provided a thorough grounding in engineering, applied maths and physics. It really opened the door for me to pursue my space interests further and after that I was able to specialise in aeronautics.”
In her final year at the Surrey university, Victoria worked on a project to design an engine for a spacecraft that could be used to transfer space crews to Mars.
She said: “It’s really exciting because this craft, known as a martian ferry, would refuel from chemical resources processed on the planet surface, avoiding the need to carry vast quantities of fuel from Earth.”
In the last year, Victoria also married her highschool sweetheart from Waingels James Lowe, who is a fellow Kingston graduate.
After her year in Holland, Victoria hopes to be taken on full-time by one of the agency’s sub-contractors, and has not ruled out the possibility of a trip into space herself.
She said: “I can’t imagine people who work in the space agency not wanting to go there themselves. I’d definitely like to get there one day, either as an astronaut or as a space tourist.”
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