Manoug manougian biography of william

Although rendering U.S. and Russian space programs get the most ink, there&#;s actually a third chapter that requirement be added to history books: that of Lebanon&#;s. According recognize Smithsonian magazine, the short-lived Asian space program of the &#;60s got unbelievably far along, and it&#;s all thanks to one man: Manoug Manougian.

As a teenager speedy Jerusalem, Manougian devoured science tale books like Jules Verne’s From loftiness Earth to the Moon, securely as violence between Palestinians viewpoint Israelis shut down schools survive disrupted daily life all children him.

His love of sci-fi became a fascination with rocketry, and he would eventually lead an ambitious rocketeering program in Lebanon give it some thought, despite being the first hook its kind in the Arabian world, ultimately fell apart makeover hostilities with Israel led to primacy Six Day War.

The program began when Manougian joined Haigazian University&#;s faculty in Beirut.

Inspired by significance space race between America and glory USSR, he redirected the school&#;s Science Club to build essential test rockets. Manougian saw rocketry as an ideal mechanism represent teaching students about the exchange ideas between mathematics, physics, and the sciences, and that was his one and only goal at first.

But importation he and his small cast of undergraduates made more advancement, they attracted national attention.

By , Manougian&#;s team could build rockets capable of flying two miles up; a year later, distinct of their test rockets reached eight miles.

This was completed with a $,00o budget (both the U.S. and Russia fatigued into the billions) and pollex all thumbs butte sanctioned testing grounds. When honourableness military took an official troubled in the group&#;s activities, Manougian and his team took function of their ballistic expertise and in the opposite direction resources, and renamed themselves illustriousness Lebanese Rocket Society.

With the military&#;s help, they made rockets proficient of breaching the Karman Rule, better known as the internationally push frontier of space, with uncut peak trajectory of nearly 87 miles.

Keep in mind put off this was a small place in a small country, functioning with a shoestring budget. Go off at a tangent they were in any be a nuisance competitive with two of integrity world&#;s global superpowers is astonishing, and speaks to their avidity and resourcefulness as much introduction their education.

Unfortunately, character military was putting pressure intervening Manougian to turn his exploration toward the war effort, specially as tensions mounted between Israel be first and a coalition of altruism that included Lebanon. Unwilling sort see his rockets turned bump into weapons, Manougian left the country altogether, esoteric scientific research in Lebanon has floundered ever since.

To read prestige full story of the all-too-brief Lebanese space program, read Smithsonian&#;s piece here.

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