What to see at Hot Docs 2017: From Bill Nye to Internet hackers and bloggers

You're Soaking In It directed by Scott Harper

By Sonya Davidson

Hot Docs, North America's largest documentary film festival presents it's 24th annual edition from April 27 to May 7, 2017 in Toronto. There will be 230 documentary films from 58 countries at this year's festival. Hot Docs is known to feature thought-provoking, insightful and often infuriating titles to the city. Here are some titles that have caught my attention... Hot Docs 2017 box office is now open www.hotdocs.ca 

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Bill Nye’s LightSail spacecraft reboots and gets in touch with Earth

Josh Spradling / The Planetary Society

Bill Nye’s sunbeam-powered spacecraft caused quite a scare for him and his company Planetary Society when it lost the ability to send information back to earth. LightSail got cut off from communications a week after it launched on May 20^th due to a software glitch. They couldn’t get it to reboot remotely and so the engineers put their hope in the “natural reboot” that would happen when it collides with stray charged particles. Thankfully, that happened and they re-established connection with the spacecraft.

LightSail was inspired by Carl Sagan’s solar sailing idea, which imagines a spacecraft using the sun in the same way a sailboat uses the wind. This month’s test hopes to prove it can unfurl it sails. If successful, a second test run will happen in April next year. LightSail is built with a small satellite and four Mylar sails to ride solar radiation. The scientists hope to prove that solar propulsion can get rid of the need for boosters or fuel reserves in spaceflight.

Source: The Verge