Toulouse 16 January 2007 PRESS RELEASE VOYAGEURS DES

Their names are Nathalie, Valentin, Tiffany, Romain, Elodie and Guilhem. They are between
15 and 16 years old and are preparing to set off as Voyageurs des sables (literally ‘sand travellers’)
on the second adventure organised by Stéphane Lévin as a part of the Voyageurs des sciences
programme. At the beginning of April 2007 they will leave Toulouse and fly to the Sahara. After last
year’s Voyageurs des Glaces expedition, these six are going to be our Voyageurs des sables.
Stéphane Lévin and his team are currently preparing the young explorers for a genuine expedition
into an exceptional environment, the Sahara Desert. They will be counting on the Touareg people
to help them adapt to the hostile conditions and will be performing scientific experiments suggested
and developed by the project partners.
The programme, proposed by Stéphane Lévin to show the relevance of science studies, will make
full use of the different facilities available for Space research and their application for the general
public. It was designed to enable 15/16-year-olds in classes falling under the Toulouse educational
authority, to discover the major environmental challenges faced by our planet, by following the
work of three expeditions in particularly fragile environments: the Arctic, the North-African Desert
and the French Guiana rain-forest.
Eleven partners have provided financial, scientific, technical and logistical support: INFOTERRA,
CNES, Caisse d’Epargne Midi Pyrénées, Cité de l’Espace, the City of Toulouse, FRAM, EADS
Astrium, Lowe Alpine, the HYDROSOLAB laboratory, CLS and the Société Midi Pyrénées de
Médecine du Sport. The project patron is the French astronaut Philippe Perrin, who participated
in the flight of Space Shuttle STS 111 from 5 to 19 June 2002.
You can meet the six new explorers at the Cité de l’Espace in Toulouse from 3pm to 5pm on
Wednesday 17 January 2007; they will be explaining the educational projects for which their
respective schools won places on the trip as well as the various tests they had to undergo during
the selection process.
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Financial support: INFOTERRA, CNES, Caisse d’Epargne Midi Pyrénées, Cité de l’Espace, the
City of Toulouse, Fram.
Scientific, technical and logistical support:
•
CNES: has developed a protocol for meteorological field measurements for the NASA/CNES
educational project GLOBE/CALISPH’AIR (Global Observation for a Better Environment).
•
EADS ASTRIUM/INFOTERRA: has made available a satellite communication system for
sound and images plus a specially adapted terminal with a geo-positioning system.
•
HYDROSOLAB laboratory: has designed and will be implementing three protocols for taking
samples (of ice, sediments, soils etc.) and analysing them, first in the field and later in the
laboratory, for the three environments studied in the programme.
•
CLS: will be testing the supply of power from solar panels to transmitter beacons in extreme
environments. It will also be pinpointing the adventurers’ position with an ‘adventure beacon’
and then tracking their progress on a Website. The 2007-2008 expeditions, will be testing new
beacons of the 3rd generation Argos instrument carried on MetOp.
•
Société Midi-Pyrénées de Médecine du Sport: is providing complete medical tests and
checkups in a hospital for all 18 of the young adventurers before and after the three
expeditions.
•
Cité de l’Espace: as the principal educational partner in the region for relaying project
information to the general public, from the preparatory stages to the return of the expedition,
the Cité de l’Espace will organise events around the key phases of the project, including an
exhibition area, Press liaison office and expedition tracking, while at the same time relaying
information to school children.
•
Lowe Alpine: has supplied appropriate clothing for the young adventurers, for both the
preparation and expedition phases.
•
Fram: is providing assistance with transfers and transport during the preparatory phases.
This adventure will be relayed by the latest generation of satellite communication resources and
may be followed daily at the Cité de l’Espace in Toulouse. The partners will also be promoting the
expedition amongst their staff and customers.
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