Tous sur orbite
Are satellites our guardian angels?
As so often happens, it’s Latin that gives us an idea of what things are. “Satellite” comes from the Latin satelles, satellitis, meaning “bodyguard”. It is in fact a natural or artificial object, that is to say manmade, which revolves around another object that is much larger and heavier than it. So we say that it is “protecting” this object. The Moon, for example, is the natural satellite of the Earth. It was in fact while observing the Moon that Sir Isaac Newton, in the 17th century, thought that it would be possible to manufacture artificial satellites.
But we had to wait for the 20th century for the technical side to catch up with the idea!
It was the Soviet Union, on 4 October 1957, which put the first artificial satellite into space. It had the pleasant name of Sputnik* 1. Since then it has had many brothers and sisters of every nationality. Almost 5,000 satellites have in fact been put into orbit*, mainly but not solely around the Earth. One thing’s for sure, we are not short of bodyguards…
