HBK CHAT VOL 22 ISS 2 NEWSLETTER

HBK People

Celebrating three decades-plus of passion for industry - Emelia Mosima

Raoul Hodges:

On 8 June 2022, Raoul Hodges celebrated his sixtieth birthday. In addition to signifying remarkable six decades of life, this yearmarks his three and half decades in SANSA. It was only befitting to dig into what contributed to his longevity, his key moments and his dream for the organisation considering that he is five years from retirement. You joined CSIR in 1987, what do you remember about your first day? I joined CSIR as a technician responsible for civil works, maintenance training, managing installation for companies and project management. I was employed to design and build a 1000kva standby power station for the then Satellite Application Centre, a Division of the CSIR. The first day was fairly intimidating as I was thrown into the deep end. I had only three months to understand the whole site – all the electrical systems, fire systems, antennas etc., as the person I was reporting to was nearing retirement. This then included the HartRao as it is known today and SRSC as Space operations. I was also on probation for 6 month s. In those 6 months I was required to write tests on a monthly basis. Has it always been your plan to stay in the same industry for this long? I have always said that when the technology challenges my brain

created a massive team effort, and built a can-do culture that will be with HBK forever. What do you like the most about working at SANSA? The people, the daily challenges, and the constant change in the industry due to the growth in technology. But also working with people, getting the best out of them and encouraging them to develop. What is the favourite part of your job? The achievements of the team; the specialist inputs from across the organisation; bringing projects to fruition; and sending out the first invoice. What do you think are the greatest developments in the global space industry and what should local space industry be doing in the next 10 years? The local industry and government have to get at least two locally built satellites in the air and prove the concepts. This will put trust in the global industry to procure from SA and will create a satellite market which will grow due to the cost of labour and the exchange rate advantage that SA has. If there’s one thing you could improve in SANSA, what would it be? I would love to see a selling culture, a customer-centric attitude and a commercial mindset across board.

and grows exponentially, I will remain interestedandchallenged and that is what has happened in the South African space sector. Till today, it changes at a rapid rate keeping me intrigued. After being with the same company for so many years, what makes you still wakeup with passion for what you do? The people at HBK are special. The industry is challenging. I can also add that new projects

and the achievements of SANSA Space Operations keeps me interested. What are some of your favourite work projects? The biggest achievement was the building of the 13,2 m ku band antenna in 1998. This was then a massive project in CSIR and took many hours of my life. There was a race against time to get to completion; deadlines were extreme. We had to prove ourselves to the international space world that we have the skills and will to pull off such a project. It pulled staff together,

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VOL 22: ISS 2