Tiffany del mastro
03/22/2021 12:13 PM
Clarín.com
Society
Updated 03/22/2021 12:13 PM
The clock struck 00.00.
Their time is up.
They had 48 hours to meet the goal.
It only remained to send the project to the other side of the hemisphere and keep
our fingers crossed.
By video call and exhausted, Wenceslao Villegas (22), Sebastián Calvera López (23), Julieta Porta (22) and Sergio Dubón Carrillo (25) celebrated their achievement: they fulfilled the slogan of NASA's "Space Apps Challenge" and developed an application to solve a
global problem.
But not only that.
The team
representing Argentina
- made up of three people from Mendoza and a Guatemalan would find out - months later - that it was
one of the best in the world
, among the 2,300 proposals.
They were recognized and awarded by international space agencies (CSA, CNES, ESA, and JAXA).
"We participated because it was another opportunity to learn and see how to develop at an international level," said Julieta Porta, a Mendoza student of Engineering in Business Management.
NASA contest.
The Argentine team won, among the 26,000 applicants, a license valued at $ 5,000 euros to carry out their invention.
As soon as Wenceslao, a Systems Engineering student, passed on WhatsApp the information of the NASA competition, his friend from high school and mechanical engineer Sebastián accepted the challenge and, together, they began to form the team.
A couple of messages were enough and they became four members: Julieta, a friend of Sebastián's faculty;
and Sergio, a chemical engineer and programming student from Guatemala, whom Wenceslao met at an exchange in South Korea.
Thus,
"Zonda Incorporated"
came to life and entered competition on October 2 and 3, 2020.
Young lovers of science and technology had already participated in
hackathons
to test their knowledge, but perhaps this was the one with the largest attendance:
26,000 people from more than 150 countries.
His chosen challenge –among the 23 problems presented– was floods.
As Latin Americans, they knew that this is a "terrible catastrophe" that requires an urgent resolution since, as they investigated, it is the one that
generates
the
most loss of life, materials and costs.
Challenge.
One of the biggest challenges was making the "Flut Mapper" application remotely by video call.
"Once we figured out general concepts, we started to think of an idea that would add value and have impact," said Sebastián.
Thus, the tasks were divided and they
worked asynchronously
, each from their home: Julieta and Wenceslao from Mendoza;
Sebastián, in Bariloche and Sergio, in Guatemala (the time difference, another challenge).
With the passage of the needles on the first day, they outlined the prototype of the
"Flut Mapper"
app
: a tool that maps floods in real time and generates simulations of future events.
How?
From the images of Sentinel-1, the artificial satellite of the European Space Agency (ESA).
Thus, it estimates the damages and allows
governments to make decisions
to mitigate risks and save lives.
"As long as there is 1% chance there will be 99% faith."
This phrase could synthesize what they felt when delivering the project.
Laughing, it occurred to them to calculate their chances of winning: less than 1%.
Against their expectations, the months that followed were astonishing: first came the celebration for being selected among the
best in the region
(Mendoza, San Juan and Bariloche);
later, the excitement of going to the next filter and being
nominated globally
- among "the best 40 in the world" -;
and, finally, the great victory.
The logo of the technological application created by Wenceslao Villegas, Sebastián Calvera López, Julieta Porta and Sergio Dubón Carrillo for NASA.
"When the email arrived saying that we were winners, it was hard for us to believe it. We were awarded in the
'Best Innovation' and 'Euro Data Cube' categories," says
Sebastián with a laugh about the great achievement that placed them among
the top eight
.
"It was impossible, but there you realize that he who does not try does not win," Sergio said.
"You think that international space agencies are distant, but with work you can get there," said Julieta, who longs to get to know NASA from the inside.
The invitation is there, but with the Covid it could not be specified.
Not only the US space agency recognized them but also the ESA, which granted them a
license valued at $ 5,000 euros
to access the satellite image database and software to make "Flut Mapper" become a reality.
One thinks that international space agencies are distant, but with work you can get there
Julieta Porta Student of Engineering in Business Management.
"If it
escalates at the country level, it
can change how flood crises are handled and generate a high impact," said Sergio.
Now, while they forge alliances with private and public entities to get the most value out of their proposal, they hope that their story will
encourage other young people to raise their ideas
, because they may be the great solution to solve a challenging global problem.
$
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