The operation to launch the first Romanian satellite into space was followed by excitement from the hands that worked on it, particularly the researchers, who worked tirelessly in an office within the Gheorgheni neighborhood in Cluj-Napoca.

With the help of a special antenna mounted by Bit Net, a company specializing in research and development within the communications sector through satellite and deep space surveillance and one of the partners involved in the Goliat (Goliath) project, the researchers from Cluj have attempted to capture the first signs of life from the satellite.

Paul Dolea, one of the initiators of the Marisel Astronomic Observatory, said, “We received a phone call from Bucharest [the capital of Romania] and received the news that the first signals from the satellite were received from an amateur radio in Florida. We missed the first pass from the satellite, but we’ll try after another hour. We attempt to receive a signal, but low-altitude satellites are very difficult to receive a signal from. They stay a few minutes just above the horizon, and stay in orbit at a very high speed - approximately 7-8 kilometers per second.”

Dolea added that within a 24-hour interval, the satellite will have two or three passes which will have favorable conditions for signal reception at Cluj. He showed that the antenna system receiving Goliat’s data aren’t so spectacular: “It looks like an antenna receiver from a television set, but they’re slightly more special. The antennas are in Cluj, not at the Marisel Astronomic Observatory, because of the bad weather. The road to the Observatory is a rather adventurous one. When the weather gets warmer, we’ll get them back to Marisel.”

Romania has been having a rather rough winter, with more than 50 deaths reported due to the extreme cold weather and overwhelming amounts of snow. Some entire villages have been buried completely under snow for at least a week, if not more.

Goliat, the first Romanian satellite, was launched at noon, in Romanian time (approx. 5 AM EST), together with the European rocket Vega, from the French Guiana cosmodrome. According to the Romanian Space Agency, Goliat separated from the rocket successfully at 1:10 PM (6:10 AM EST). The satellite itself is a cube measuring 10 centimeters on each side and weighs approximately one kilogram, developed by the Romanian Space Agency together with Romania’s Space Science Institute. The development took place between 2005 and 2007.