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Should you wish to contact the
society or require general information please contact ASTRA
using the following Email address: Should you encounter any problems
with this Web
Page please
email: March 31. BIS Chairman Arthur
C. Clarke announces an increase in membership fees (e.g.
ordinary membership rose to £1 11s 6d, then equivalent
to £4.50!). This was with a view to acquiring premises
and clerical staff. Sept. 3-8. BIS holds Second
International Congress on Astronautics in London. Topics
included 'Meteor Hazards to Space Stations', by M.W.
Ovenden, and 'Descent from Satellite Orbits Using
Aerodynamic Braking', by T.R. Nonweiler. Both speakers were
to be prominent in Scottish activities. The Congress was attended by
Prof.
Hermann Oberth, one of the
three scientists who independently worked out and published
the basic theories of astronautics (the others being
Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, in Russia in the 1890's but not
published till the 1920's, and Robert Goddard in the USA,
who published just after Oberth). The appearance of Oberth's
"Die Rakete" in 1924 led to the formation in Germany of the
VfR, the first spaceflight society, and so to the German
rocket programme which was taken over by the USA after World
War II. At the Congress Prof. Oberth had a
reunion with Oscar
Schwiglhofer, who had studied
physics under Oberth in Transylvania before the War. Oscar
had dreamed of founding a spaceflight society himself, and
now he was settled in Scotland he decided to set about
it. 1952
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Date Last Modified: 31 07 1999