Space Concordia: inside the minds of the engineers
After making history this summer with successful launch, the student club begins thinking big for satellite #2
Chelsea Bahenduzi will never forget seeing a poster taped to a bathroom stall at the John Molson School of Business (JMSB).
Plastered on the wall was an image — a small triangle-shaped rocket blasting straight upwards into the darkness of space, with the earth receding out of frame below. Emblazoned in bold white lettering was a simple message: “CONCORDIA IS GOING.”
Bahenduzi didn’t know it then, but four years from that moment, she would be standing on a beach in Florida, watching a SpaceX rocket carry something she helped build out of the atmosphere. Destination: outer space.
The poster that started it all for Bahenduzi is still displayed on the ninth floor of the Hall Building, inside the cozy, colourful and cramped offices of Space Concordia.
A civil engineering student and casual space fan, Bahenduzi showed up at a Space Concordia meeting in 2019 after seeing the peculiar poster. “I thought it was mostly like a social club, something for space-related events,” she said. “But I got there and they were like, ‘We're building a spacecraft that's launching into space!’”
Founded in 2010, the student organization now supports divisions in spacecraft, rocketry, robotics and space health. But it was the spacecraft division that made the biggest news this summer with their successful satellite launch, the culmination of five years and thousands of hours of labour. Now they’re gearing up to do it all again.
It was on the ninth floor of the Hall building where work began on the satellite project in 2018, thanks to a $200,000 grant from the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).
Concordia was one of fifteen post-secondary institutions nationwide — and the only one in Quebec — chosen to participate in the Canadian CubeSat Project, which aims to give budding engineers rare hands-on experience with building a satellite of their own. Small satellites assembled in blocks about as big as a Rubik’s Cube, CubeSats are a low-cost option for student groups because their size makes them easy to launch onboard larger rockets.
Bahenduzi i volunteered as the club’s social media manager, but it wasn’t long before she quickly became more involved with the satellite activities. She said it was the passion of her fellow students who kept her coming back. “
The team eventually dubbed the CubeSat Space Concordia’s Orbital Dust Imaging Nanosat(SC-ODIN). The spacecraft captured images of dust storms in Argentina and Namibia, studying the aerosol particles to help advance climate research.
A lack of in-person access to the lab would prove to be only one of many challenges. Pandemic isolation and graduating members meant less documentation, leaving questions for newer members down the line. Issues with batteries — a vital component for astronaut safety aboard the International Space Station(ISS) — stacked up.
But Bahenduzi said she and her team remained determined. “Every time we failed, it was like, ’We’re finding a solution. We can't give up on this project.’”
Electrical lead Gabriel Dubé said the team “spent a full year just struggling to get it done on time,” adding that they missed launch windows in late 2022 and early 2023 because things simply weren’t done. “We actually finalized the satellite the day before it was handed off. So it was super difficult.”
Despite the challenges, on June 5, 2023, the SC-ODIN launched from Cape Canaveral aboard a SpaceX cargo rocket bound for the ISS. A group of around thirty students and alumni made the trip to Florida to watch the liftoff from nearby Playalinda Beach.
Watching the rocket exit the atmosphere, Bahenduzi said she felt a mixture of disbelief, relief and also pride. “I’m so proud of everyone that worked so hard and actually managed to do it.”
“To see all that work you've done actually come to an end is pretty incredible,” Dubé said. “The fact that something you've built with your hands is on the rocket and in space now — it was really something to witness and we were super, super happy.”
Fresh off their record-setting success, it wasn’t long before the good news arrived about a new round of funding — $350,000 from the CSA’s CubeSats Initiative in Canada for STEM (CUBICS). The team now has two years to prepare a second, more advanced satellite, with a projected launch window in late 2025 or early 2026.
Dubé, promoted to project manager alongside fellow student Jonathan Bissonnette, predicts that this next project will be “even more of a challenge” than its predecessor. To start, the satellite’s mission is now twofold. It will use an AI-powered image processing system to help conduct forest fire analysis aiding first responders. The satellite will also carry up a payload from AstroYeast — a Concordia student and alumni research team — to test how its food source fares in space. Paying homage to the Norse god of harvest, the team has named the new project SC-FREYR.
With quite the workload ahead of them, mechanical structures and thermal lead Jazmin Bhairo says the team needs “a lot more hands on deck.” Although Bhairo is now in a leadership position, only one year ago she was a new member herself.
Growing up in Ontario, Bhairo was always passionate about space, but it wasn’t until she attended a Women in Engineering conference in high school that she discovered the field of aerospace engineering. “I've never budged from wanting to do aerospace since then,” she said. “That's why I love being in Space Concordia because I feel like I'm already in the field. All the hands-on experience, the networking, the connections you can make to the industry, it really puts you ahead.”
Bhairo said she’s excited to see the SC-FREYR project through. She added that the team has learned to document everything as an important lesson from their time working on SC-ODIN. “Of course, we're still going to run into mishaps here and there, but that’s going to save us a lot of money, time, effort and sleep.”
All three members were quick to emphasize that Space Concordia remains open to students of all skill levels. “We all come in with zero knowledge,” Dubé said. “So the people that have been here for longer are going to teach you how to do it. You get to do it yourself and then you teach it after.”
The arrival of a new project also means saying goodbye to longtime members like Bahenduzi, who stepped down from Space Concordia after the SC-ODIN launch. Her future likely won’t lie in aerospace, but she says what she learned about leadership and project management has been invaluable to her career.
“I would recommend everyone to join a club — maybe not Space Concordia, if you’re not interested in space — but by joining a club, you learn a lot,” she said. “I wouldn't have had opportunities like a project management internship, travelling, and doing conferences if it wasn't for space. It’s all because of space.”
