Israeli Trailblazers Show
Every episode leaves you smarter, genuinely amazed, and seeing your own personal world differently. Strangers you've never met are making your life easier, safer, and healthier right now — and you're about to meet them. Wildfires stopped before the fire trucks leave the station. Cancer caught in five minutes, from your couch. Seizures predicted hours ahead. All from a country the size of New Jersey — the one the world can't stop arguing about. Elon Musk calls Israel #1 in innovation per capita. In under 20 minutes, host Jennifer Weissmann introduces you to the innovators and thinkers behind the breakthroughs you personally rely on.
Israeli Trailblazers Show
Wildfire Detection From Space: Spotting a Single Burning Tree Before You Smell Smoke | Terra Space Labs
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
LA. Hawaii. Paradise. Families lost everything while fire departments arrived too late. A former Israeli defense engineer turned 30 years of classified satellite expertise into Terra Space Labs — a system that can spot a single burning tree from orbit and alert the fire department in seconds, before a fire even becomes a fire.
_______________________________________________
Your life is better because of Israelis you've never met.
⭐ Loved this? A 5-star review takes 5 seconds and is how new listeners find us.
🎧 All episodes + every platform: pod.link/1585604285
📺 YouTube: @israelitrailblazers | 📧 Substack: findinginspiration.substack.com
We are called the startup nation. And in a startup nation, we have to innovate all the time. It is a matter of culture that was developed. The need developed the culture, the culture developed the innovation, and it is a rotating system that works all the time to impact programs that will help to make the whole world a better place to live. Our satellite will be able to detect a single tree fire, and a constellation of 24 satellites will revisit every tree on the globe every half an hour. The rotating payload, which includes the camera, which requires state-of-the-art technology, and Israel has it.
SPEAKER_01What if we could stop wildfires before they even start? In 2025, Los Angeles had a fire that devastated and wiped out entire communities, and it cost over $53 billion in damage. But imagine if technology could detect the spark of a single burning tree before it turns into that disaster. That's the promise of an Israeli company called Terra Space Labs. It's an Israeli satellite company giving Forests kind of a superpower, an eye in the sky, a digital watchdog that watches the moment that danger is spotted. Today I'm joined with one of the founders of Terra Space Labs, Moshe Shachar, and he is going to share how his breakthrough technology could actually change the future of wildfire prevention. Welcome, Moshe. Thank you. How can a satellite in space spot a fire in a tree somewhere on Earth? How does that work?
SPEAKER_00The answer lies in the technology of multicolor infrared photography. We are relying on one of the most basic laws in physics. Every object in the nature radiates at a wavelength that is temperature dependent. The sun, the earth, and fire have different temperatures. Therefore, we build an infrared camera with filters differentiating between the light of the fire and other radiation sources. Our satellite will be able to detect a single tree fire, and a constellation of 24 satellites will revisit every tree on the globe every half an hour. The rotating payload, which includes the camera, which requires state-of-the-art technology, and Israel has it.
SPEAKER_01Unique scanning. So this satellite can scan with infrared technology to see the color differentiation of a fire. It can use AI to determine if it's really a fire or it's something else.
SPEAKER_00You have to distinguish between fires and other sources. This is part of the computer analysis.
SPEAKER_01Say the satellite sees a fire in San Diego. How does that fire get communicated to the local fire department? How do they know, oh, there's a tree in this park and it's on fire? How does that work?
SPEAKER_00Once the satellite detects the fire, there is a communication payload in the satellite, which is a commodity payload that transmits the alarm information to a small ground terminal. For example, to cover California, you need two to three ground terminals like this, no more. And to cover the whole United States, you need about 10 to 20 ground terminals like this. Once the alarm message comes from the satellite to space, immediately, in seconds after the detection, the ground terminal is connected to the internet, and the message will come to a command and control center, and the command and control center will handle it.
SPEAKER_01From the moment that your satellite detects a fire and communicates it to the ground and then onto the local fire dispatch, how long do you think that is in terms of minutes?
SPEAKER_00Within seconds after detection, the command and control center will get the information and we have to do something.
SPEAKER_01Are there other satellites in the world that are doing this kind of fire detection work?
SPEAKER_00Global fire detection from space with satellite is a major solution to the wildfire problem. However, our competitors are a little bit before us. We have a very good solution, probably with advantage and much more cost-effective. We have an proven engineering model of our payload operating in the lab, and we are looking for fund to bring this nano satellite to space. Our design is a payload that can be connected to almost every satellite, which is a great advantage of our design. We don't need a unique satellite.
SPEAKER_01Does the weather affect the satellite's ability to see a fire?
SPEAKER_00Yes. There is one weak point. The satellite cannot detect fire under clouds. Oh, okay. It is not 100% of the cases, but not 0% of the cases.
SPEAKER_01So does that mean then if there's a wildfire and there's a lot of smoke from the fire, can the satellite not see the fire? No, we can look through smoke. So the clouds are the problem, the smoke is not.
SPEAKER_00No.
SPEAKER_01Understood. Okay. And what is a nanosatellite?
SPEAKER_00A nanosatellite, by definition, is a satellite that has a weight of up to 20 kilograms and a volume of up to 16 liters. Very small.
SPEAKER_01How do you get a nanosatellite on the ground attached to a larger satellite that's up in space already? How does that work?
SPEAKER_00This is a good question because the satellites in the constellation are spread in several layers. And one of the nice concepts that we designed is that we don't need for every layer a launch. We need whatever the number of satellites is, just four launches, and the satellites spread themselves in space to the right position, start to orbit, and the job is done. SpaceX, for example, is the most uh famous company today that launches satellites. And I hope Elon Musk is hearing now what we are saying.
SPEAKER_01I'm sure Elon would like to get his hands on your proprietary technology. Now, how did you come up with the concept, you, Moshe, and your team, about this need for enhanced fire protection through nano satellite technology?
SPEAKER_00As for myself, I have more than 30 years of experience in space program engineering and management. My last position was the head of the satellite department in the Ministry of Defense. And it is not a secret that we have remote sensing satellites in our defense environment.
SPEAKER_01Israel has remote satellites.
SPEAKER_00All my friends are a collection of engineers, scientists, and space program managers that came from this culture and industry. And all together we made up this concept and developed this unique payload.
SPEAKER_01And the other existing companies that are out there with satellite technology to detect fires, do they not have that payload that turns?
SPEAKER_00I'm not going to say that someone else do not have it. We did not break physical laws. We just have the knowledge what the technology in general and what the technology in Israel is available to do. We combined it together to a very nice concept.
SPEAKER_01Why do you think Israelis think outside the box so much?
SPEAKER_00It's hard to say.
SPEAKER_01That's the million-dollar question.
SPEAKER_00We are coming from a culture educated to make innovations. All my life was in a school of innovation.
SPEAKER_01I mean, the size of the country is so small, and the contributions that Israelis have to mankind is so large. Why do you think that is?
SPEAKER_00We are called the startup nation. And in a startup nation, we have to innovate all the time. It is a matter of culture that was developed. Yes. The need developed the culture, the culture developed the innovation, and it is a rotating system that works all the time to impact programs that will help to make the whole world a better place to live.
SPEAKER_01Let's say you get all the funding that you need. How many satellites would cover the globe?
SPEAKER_00To get a revisit time of once per half hour of every point in the globe, we need 48 nanosatellites.
SPEAKER_01You need funding for 48. How much funding does that mean? What are you looking for?
SPEAKER_00We would like to start with 24 nanosatellites, which is good enough. For this number of nanosatellites, we need $90 million, 9-0, which is a small amount of money compared to the disasters today in the world.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. I mean, just this year, Los Angeles, last year we had Hawaii, we had Boulder, Colorado, the year before that. The fire damage is wiping out communities. The thing that we're not talking about is the rising cost of insurance, but insurance rates are through the roof. And in certain states in America, insurance companies are exiting the market completely because it's just too expensive to compete. Aside from killing people and destroying communities, it has a very big ripple effect. How long would it take you to build 24 nanosatellites?
SPEAKER_00Once we get the whole money, three years, the constellation can be in space.
SPEAKER_01So with $90 million in three years, you've covered the entire planet with enough satellites to detect a fire in a tree somewhere in Las Vegas. Yes. Amazing. Fires have destroyed so many lives all over the globe. And if this proprietary Israeli technology by Terra Space Labs can help all of us, then we're all in for good luck. Let's hope that Terra Space Labs change how we fight wildfires, save lives, save homes, save communities. On the Israeli Trailblazers show, we share the breakthrough stories that the media rarely shares. I'm your host, Jennifer Weissman. If this episode moved you, please share it with a friend. Until next time.
