'It could illuminate an area the size of a football stadium': How Russia launched a giant space mirror in 1993

It sounds like a plan a James Bond villain might come up with: launching a giant mirror into orbit to capture the Sun's rays and then redirecting them to a target on Earth. Yet, this is exactly what the Russian space agency Roscosmos tried to do on February 4, 1993.

The goal of the Znamya project, which means "banner" in Russian, was not an evil plan to hold the world hostage. Instead, its more idealistic aim, as presenter Kate Bellingham explained on BBC Tomorrow's World before Znamya's launch, was "to light up Arctic cities in Siberia during the dark winter months." Essentially, it sought to bring sunlight back to Russia's polar regions after nightfall. Even today, this seems like a novel idea, yet using mirrors in space to reflect light onto the Earth's surface was not new. In 1923, German rocket pioneer Hermann Oberth proposed it in his book, The Rocket into Planetary Space. His self-published book, based on a PhD thesis rejected by Heidelberg University for being too implausible, mathematically demonstrated how a rocket could leave Earth's orbit. Among other ideas in the book were the potential effects of space travel on the human body, how to launch satellites into orbit, and the concept of creating a grid of large adjustable concave mirrors to reflect sunlight onto a specific point on Earth. Oberth believed this illumination could help prevent disasters, like the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, or aid in rescuing survivors. He also speculated that space mirrors could clear shipping lanes by melting icebergs or even manipulate Earth's weather patterns.

The idea of a space mirror was revisited by German physicists during World War Two. At the Nazi weapons research center in Hillersleben, scientists worked on designing a frightening reflective orbiting weapon called the Sonnengewehr, or Sun gun in German. In 1945, Time magazine reported that captured German scientists had informed US Army interrogators that the Sonnengewehr was intended to act as a death ray, redirecting sunlight to ignite cities or evaporate water in lakes. Despite the evident skepticism from their US interrogators when they handed over their technical drawings, the German scientists believed their Sun gun could be operational in 50 years, according to Lieutenant Colonel John Keck, the chief of Allied technical intelligence, who spoke to reporters at the time.