Guardian

Dr. Leo Daniels—a launch vehicle consultant for both NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA)—is Provost at Kwara State University, where he is developing Nigeria’s first degree programme in Aeronautics and Astronautics.

J.K. Obatala met the 47 year old aeronautical engineer—who helped design ESA’s Arienne-5 rocket—in Abuja, during the recent Media Dialogue of the National Space Research and Development Agency. Born in a small village, near Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, the Catholic father of four has studied, worked and lectured around the world—and is credited with more than 100 peer-reviewed papers. Daniels has been a Visiting Professor at the University of California (Berkeley) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and holds two aeronautical patents in the U. K  Among other things, he stresses the importance of launch vehicle manufacturing, calls for an indigenous aircraft industry and speaks candidly about the limitations of Nigeria’s Space Programme. Daniels and his France-born Nigerian wife reside in Gainesville, Georgia U.S.A.

Just for the record, you are professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics at Kwara State University?

I’m Provost at Kwara State University, Ilorin. I was brought in to build an Engineering Programme, from the bottom up — with emphasis on Aeronautics and Astronautics.

It’s the first academic effort, ever, in this country, to look at Space Systems, including launch vehicles, for space transportation and human space exploration….

What, in a nutshell, is “aeronautics” and “astronautics”?

They are distinct but overlapping disciplines. That’s why we’re offering them together. “Astronautics” is the body of scientific research and instruction that deals with space flight.

Space, according to the United Nations, begins 100 km beyond Earth’s atmosphere and doesn’t end. It is that part of our environment that is referred to variously as the “cosmos” or the “universe”.

“Aeronautics” is the science of atmospheric flight. It is concerned with the movement of both rockets and winged aircraft through the air.

A spacecraft must first pass through Earth’s atmosphere to reach space. It is important, therefore, to understand both the dynamics of the atmosphere and the forces at work in space.

It should be noted too, that while all conventional spacecraft are rockets, all rockets are not spacecraft. Guided and ballistic missiles are rockets. But their flight trajectories lie largely in the upper atmosphere.

How far along are you in getting the programme set up?

It’s getting to two years now. We’ve got 200-level students in six programmes—Aeronautics and Astronautics, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Materials Science, Electrical Engineering and Computer...

…We’re recruiting professors in each of these areas…and building gradually towards a degree programme. But the most important area, for us, is Aeronautics and Astronautics…

You’re from Akwa Ibom. How did you end up at Kwara State University?

I was brought to Kwara State by Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki, the former Governor…I was giving a lecture at Harvard University… and came to the notice of Prof. Wole Soboyejo… President of the African University of Science and Technology. One thing led to another. And here I am.

My interest in going into this high-tech kind of thing, is to see if Nigeria can develop a programme in aeronautics that would point us, not only towards space exploration, but also an aircraft systems industry…We need to think about manufacturing aircraft.

That’s refreshing to hear. I think Nigerian policy makers may be a bit too practical. Pragmatism seems to be stunting the growth of indigenous self-reliance and collective self-confidence.

Yes!

Your programme at Kwara State University obviously isn’t “practical” now. But an aircraft or space industry will never become a reality, unless someone does what you are doing.

Exactly! They don’t know how difficult it is. The space faring nations used 50 years to get to where they are. They started with small, small efforts. And they invested a lot of money. Sometimes they failed. But failure didn’t kill the programme. They kept going.

What is being done in Nigeria, is a drop of water in the ocean…They get foreigners to send satellites into space. All that is, to me, too elementary. But as long as you can take it into space, it doesn’t matter how it gets there!

The most important thing, which I would really want this country to invest heavily in, is an aviation industry….

An aviation industry is absolutely essential…

Yes. It’s essential…

This leads me to a curious anomaly. At none of the many conferences I attend, do participants talk about manufacturing—which is necessary for what you are trying to do.

You may have noticed that I discussed manufacturing a little bit, during my presentation—when I was talking about “re-entry systems”… the re-entry system of a launch vehicle for hypersonic flight

That’s faster than the speed of sound. Hypersonic flight is sustained in the neighborhood of about 10 to 15 minutes during re-entry. The temperature is about 1600 degrees Celsius.

If you’re face with the challenge of re-entry, you need to manufacture a system that will withstand the time and temperature you are flying through.

You bring the materials together, to create a composite structure. That is where manufacturing comes in. It means getting to the workshop, cutting materials, joining them together and making it happen...

Aeronautics is nothing like going to heaven. It sounds very big. But it’s simply careful manufacturing systems, put in place, so that when you roll it out, you know you have a system you can rely on.

All these aircraft that are being manufactured, that’s what they do.

If Nigeria is going to do this type of thing, it means resuscitating the steel industry…

I wanted to mention that. Thank you for saying it. But I didn’t want to cause a political problem at the Media Dialogue…

Yes. I can understand that. I was watching the strained faces of the SSTL executives. They didn’t like what you were saying at all!

Yes. I didn’t want to just jam this thing on them. But the steel industries at Ajaokuta and Aladja were built, how many years ago now? That industry is dead. No steel is rolling out.

Yet this is fundamental. This is the bottom line. I mean, you can call it, the basic thing that this country needs to have—i.e., to rollout steel.

Steel will give us the kind of manufacturing industry we’re looking for. In aeronautics, we’re also looking at aluminum materials. We’re looking at titanium materials. We can manufacture all of those items here.

Nigeria has all of these things…

Yes. Nigeria has it. We are very rich, when it comes to natural resources. But the issue here is, do we have the culture? Do we have the temperament?

We certainly have the expertise to do it. But let’s look at curriculum development, which I’m involved in at Kwara State University.

I’m facing a lot of constraints… I mean, a lot of challenges. Nigeria has a decrepit educational system, which it seems, can never be changed.

Look, Charles Stark Draper, who started the famous instrumentation laboratory at M.I.T., which now bears his name, was not a physicist to begin with. He first read psychology, at Stanford, then came to M.I.T and took degrees in electrochemical engineering and physics.

Psychology?...

Psychology… Yet he turned out to be one of the best scientists ever! But you wouldn’t know his background, because he was given a lot of mathematical education.

The point I’m making, is that everybody in our educational system should know mathematics and physics up to the 300 level.

That was what helped Draper to change over from the social sciences to the physical sciences...

Then you’re talking about astronomy. You’re going to learn about stars. You’re talking about space exploration. If you want to be independent, as an African, you have to do these things. We have to go into space, like everyone else is doing.

If you want to really have national security, for example, you need an aerial surveillance system—which means you have to be in space.

You’ll also need to master robotic avionics. In the U.S.A., for instance, I’m teaching a course called “Intelligent Unmanned Vehicles”. An intelligent unmanned vehicle is one that can fly without a pilot…

It’s a drone?...

Yes. I’m talking about the drone system. The system is integrated with sensors and a lot of other reconnaissance tools. You don’t need to go anywhere. You just send these things to fly around and gather data…or carry weapons…

I’m trying to introduce this into the curriculum of Kwara State University... It will take about ten years before we come to a full programme of intelligent unmanned vehicles.

Other things, such as designing structures, could be done in five years—if we have adequate funding and the right people to work with.

What kind of reaction are you getting to your effort at Kwara State?

Well, let me tell you the truth. When I arrived, I was welcomed with open arms. But the challenge I’m facing now is funding.

So I have to go out of my way to source money from the Tertiary Educational Trust Fund (TET-FUND), which is the former ETF (Educational Trust Fund). I’ve gotten them to invest and buy equipment.

This is the only indigenous source of funding available that will help us build that kind of programme. Other funding initiatives are focused outside this country.

Will foreign donors actually fund a strategic programme like this?

Oh yes. Yes. There is the International Training Agreement (ITA), which provides support for malaria eradication efforts, as well as special programmes like ours.

We also work, financially, with several other institutions. We’ve signed memorandums of understanding (MOUs) with Princeton and Columbia Universities, for instance. We are also about to sign an MOU with Harvard.

M.I.T. is very restrained. But we might be able to get something in the future. We’ve signed an MOU with the Korea Advance Institute of Science and Technology…

Is that South Korea?

Yes… Kwara State University is making an impact in many, many ways. The key area is engineering. The connectivity, with other institutions around the world, which we have achieved in three years, is huge.

Also, the kinds of people they are bringing in to build this programme are of a very high quality. They don’t come for money.

I certainly am not there for personal gain. My consultation fee alone, in the U. S.A., would carry me. I don’t need to work. I consult for NASA. I consult for the Arienne-5 rocket programme of the European Space Agency (ESA), as well as with Boeing and Lockheed Martin.

When you say ‘consult,’ what do you mean? What does that entail?

If they want to design something, for example, they’ll look at various configurations and take an option. But before they decide, they will bring me in to advise them, as to the advantages of doing it this way or that way.

When advising them, I rely on my background, my experience with launch vehicles. They are currently building the Ares V/Ares I launch vehicles, to take U.S. astronauts to the Moon. This is under the NASA Constellation Programme, which I also consult for.

I advise them on matters such as system integration and structural dynamics…

You mentioned ESA. Are you involved with the Arienne-6 spacecraft?

No. Arienne-6 is still in the developmental stage. But I did consult for the Arienne-5 rocket, which is presently the main working vehicle for ESA. They use it to launch most of their satellites into orbit.

I generally consult for heavy use and re-useable launch vehicles… You know…the typical Space Shuttle type rockets that can be refurbished and used again after each mission.

How did you get started with launch vehicles?

When I finished my Ph.D., at the University of London and Queen Mary, I worked for one year as a Research Fellow at the Centre for National Research in Science (C.N.R.S.) in France...from where I was recruited to the European Space Agency (ESA).

After three years in France, I returned to the U.k. and started a research programme at Cambridge and at Crownsfield University, in Milton Keynes. From there, I went to University of California at Berkeley, as a visiting professor—and got interested in launch vehicles.

Were you ever actually part of a vehicle design team?

Yes. Before moving to the United States, from the U.K., I worked with a joint project of the European Space Agency and NASA, called the “Crew Return Vehicle”...

NASA and ESA wanted to build a reusable rocket, so astronauts could leave the International Space Station and return to Earth safely, in case of an emergency.

But the European Union and the U.S.A. couldn’t reach an ownership agreement. So the project was canceled—after two years of work.

The spacecraft had actually been tested and was ready to go. In fact, if you go to the Houston Space Centre it’s there…[He shows me the vehicle on the screen of his Blackberry phone]…I use it as background…That is what we built. It would have replaced the Space Shuttle.

What this really means, I suppose, is that, given the resources, you could help make Nigeria a serious space-faring nation?

That was my original intention. That was the benchmark. I wanted to position Nigeria in aerospace—an area that is very, very difficult to get into. If you can build a launch vehicle, you’ll also be able to build an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM)…

This is a very sensitive subject. But I’m an Astronomy/Space Science columnist; and my views are well known. “Space for national development” is fine, as a way of raising public awareness. But policy makers are going to have to move beyond this eventually, to a manned space programme.  Putting astronauts on other people’s rockets simply is not going to get Nigeria anywhere…

Oh yes! You are quite correct…. Launching a man in space is something that could be done, if we would build capacity from the bottom up and create a manufacturing base. Train our students… Get the curriculum right… and push the envelope in that direction.

Ten to 20 years from now, you’ll see results...But you can’t continue to give your launches and payload production out to overseas experts…I’m happy to see that NASRDA is at least thinking along these lines. But they are thinking too small…

Do you think “space” should become something like a national ideology? That everybody should be mobilized towards the achievement of specific objectives?

You know, what the Indians did, very effectively, was to use the media to raise public awareness. Nigeria should do the same thing...

If you give it to government, to really get this thing going, it may not work exactly the way we want it to. But it will galvanize the public. Use the media to campaign about the space programme…

I noticed that two things are missing in Nigeria. One is a tradition of popular science—i.e., science for the common man. This, in fact, is what motivated me to start my Astronomy column, in The Guardian, 11 years ago. The other is science fiction—which is very strong in most other countries.

Oh. I will tell you, my desire to do what I’m doing dates back to a class I took in Russia. Anyway, I started as a medical student at Obafemi Awolowo University. Then I got a scholarship to study medicine in Russia—then the Soviet Union.

I studied for about three years; and I did not like it. I was the best student in the class. But I told myself, I had to leave. There was one Russian professor, who was teaching me physics. He was explaining Einstein’s famous formula, E=MC2.

The way he was explaining it motivated me. So I said to myself, “Wow. I’m getting to look at something that will give me fulfillment. Right from that time I changed. My mom was very angry. “Why are you changing? I want you to be a doctor!”

But she didn’t know I had found something I wanted to do. I wanted to go into physics. So I went to the professor and said, “I want to be like you”.

He asked me if I were serious. I said “Yes”. He then invited me to his office. Books were piled up everywhere. He said, “Take this book, go and read it. Then come back”… The book was written in Russian.

You read Russian?

Yes. I speak Russian, fluently.

Do you speak any other languages?

Well, a bit of German; and I struggle with French. But I’m not fluent in it. Of course, I speak my mother tongue, Ibibio.

O.k., go on with your narrative.

So…I was fascinated. I was carried away. I said, “How do I get into this?”

In the Soviet Union, a foreigner could not go into aeronautics and astronautics—because of the secrets they were hiding. But he introduced me to another professor, who opened up and said, “Come. I will take you to somewhere…”

He took me to a science school, where they put native Russians who were learning aeronautics and astronautics. He showed me a pencil that they took into space—a pencil that could write, even if it dropped in water. He showed me so many things about space...

You withdrew from medical school?

Yes. I started taking Mathematics, Physics and everything…People were calling me a fool! They said I was crazy! “Why do you want to do this?”

But here I am. I don’t regret it. I told my Mom I would…obtain my doctorate degree, to satisfy her urge to have a “Doctor” in the family. “With a Ph.D.,” I said, “you can still call me “Doctor”!

She agreed; and I moved on.

So how do we get to the point, where the world will take us seriously?

…If Nigeria is serious about becoming a space faring nation, we have to define our priorities. What we are doing now is just a joke! I’m serious, when I tell you that.

It’s not the fault of the Director General of NASRDA, Dr. S.O. Mohammed. I applaud him for what he has done so far. The problem is at the policy level. It’s conceptual.

Nigeria simply is not ready for the kind of thing I’m interested in, such as the manufacture of launch vehicles that can carry a man into space…

What NASRDA is doing now is a quick-fix. The challenges we should be preparing for require 50 years to master.

We ought to be looking into the future, to see where our strategic interests will lie. Why should we invest in space? It’s because we want to be competitive, now and forever. We want to define and work out our national destiny, without external constraints.

We don’t have to ask Surrey Satellite Technology to design a spacecraft for us. It’s something we can do. It’s an engineering problem…

And Nigeria has plenty of engineers…

We have so many. We have so many people who can think. So why can’t the Government challenge Nigerian engineers?...Not only in aeronautics and astronautics but also in every other area where there are engineering tasks…?

Policy makers don’t seem to have a strong sense of nationalism. Maybe that’s the problem?

That’s true. If we have a leader that will inculcate national pride in us, things will happen. Nigerians are sensitive to nationalism…

Yes. They are. Most detractors don’t know that. But I give lots of public speeches. Nationalist themes draw strong reactions from audiences.

They like this country. They love Nigeria…

What is your take on Nigeria’s Nuclear Programme?

…Nigeria is not yet mature enough for nuclear weapons. I don’t think we are prepared, even in Africa.

But if you want nuclear technology for energy supply, i.e. for electricity, we can do it…But if you want to go into nuclear weapon technology, don’t.  It’ll blow in our faces… because we are not sufficiently disciplined...

Otherwise, we would be able to construct roads…supply water…and build the basic infrastructure that is common to any nation.

But we are still inviting other people to do these things; and they are sucking our money. And then you think we can go for nuclear weapons…?

But you have no objection, in principle—provided the discipline is there?

If we become disciplined, of course…I’d be a part of that programme. I’d make sure that we do it. It would position us against enemies. No aggressor would mess up with Nigeria! We could say, “Don’t do that”. And they wouldn’t.…

Let’s get back to the popularization of science. This country doesn’t have a strong tradition of science fiction—a neglected tool, that is vitally important.

You know what? That book the Russian professor gave me was science fiction!

It was a science fiction novel?

Yes. Science fiction helped propel me to where I am! I can remember lying on my bed, reading this book, not sleeping. No other book had ever fascinated me to that extent.

Science fiction has enabled Russia, formerly the Soviet Union, to be where they are in the space industry. Science fiction!

How do we do that here?

It is by going into our primary schools to tell science fiction stories. You know, inspire children to dream about what can happen. Bring them up like that.

Then you work your way up to higher age groups, who can digest more serious literature. You’ll come out with a different type of Nigerian—a more socially beneficial person.

You see how American and Russian children are doing, how science fiction is benefitting these countries? A Russian professor, 20 years old, was teaching me mathematics!...

Where do you get the textbooks you are using, at Kwara State University?

We don’t use textbooks. But we have this agreement with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.). Kwara State students can access all the courses taught at M.I.T. It’s free.

Students can download courses and lectures and everything. They can go to the library, the electronic library, and read on line. We don’t have money to buy books. But we are subscribing to key electronic books and journals—publications that will help the students.

Aside from consulting, lecturing and your administrative duties at Kwara State University, what else are you doing?

I’m writing two books. One is on “Bio-Inspired Aerospace Structures”. It has to do with the physics of flapping wings… We say “Bio-Inspired,” because it is based on the mechanics of animal flight.

This is the technology of miniature drones, used in spying. These small aircraft can have the physical appearance of butterflies, bees, bugs or birds; and they can carry cameras, microphones or lethal weapons. The New York Times has published quite a lot about this.

I’m writing another book on aerospace engineering. I’m almost finished with that one. They are reviewing it right now. My co-author is a NASA guy, named William Bhat. He’s from India; and a very smart fellow.

You mentioned off-tape, that you were holding two patents?

Yes. One is on a composite structure, which was the subject of my Ph.D. research, in Aerospace Engineering. My dissertation is not published. The U.K. Department of Defense (D.O.D.) considers it classified.

Your dissertation is classified?

Yes. Something came out of the research, which is used by the Defense Evaluation Research Agency for internal analysis of the crash readiness of aircraft system... The model is patented. I don’t have money problems or anything like that, because it’s D.O.D. property.

And then, there is another patent, which has to do with the landing gear system…of a plane. When the aircraft drops, my device has maximum shock-absorbing capability, with minimum impact on the passengers.