our friend t has a passion for geeky stuff!
yup, this time he was working for many months on a high altitude balloon. there was lots to program his gps, his celly, the camera. as you can see, those things finely had to fit into the magic box. the balloon was expected to get up, about 100'000ft high! just thinking about this got my head spinning.
a latex balloon was filled with helium, it's diameter was just a bit over 2yards.
it was a spectacle, some neighbors showed up too, our kids were thrilled and so excited about this. t is great, he included as many of his friends as possible to get that balloon up into the air. and the weather was just perfect for this undertaking, a sunny, not too windy but clear morning!
there it goes, the red ball is the para-shoot for the "golden box". this was needed as the balloon was expected to pop and the box will then be falling down to earth with tons of photos, the gps will send the signal to t's celly and he (with all his friends) hunted the box down in the afternoon.
yes the balloon rose it's expected height of 100'000 ft (30'000m) and yes the box fell down. it landed unharmed (the para-shoot worked) in the middle of an alpine meadow.
here a few more photos
1 comment:
How awesome is that! Zach took the kids to a rocket launch where they launched several rockets which were 2 stories high. One of the rockets the parachute didn't work and none of the jettison came off like it should and I believe it fell to earth just beside the road. Pretty scary, I think. Balloons seem much safer. There is a geek in our household too.
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