The GPS cell phone we used to track the location of our vehicle lost reception soon after launch (at an elevation of ~2500 feet). Although we had expected to lose contact with the balloon, the altitude of “last-report” was much lower than expected.
After loss of electronic contact, we could continued to track the capsule visually for about half an hour until the glare of the sun prevented further viewing.
GPS information recorded in the flight logs reported a maximum altitude of 19,853 feet due to software limitations. With some simple approximations (linear extrapolation of velocity – a fair assumption justified after looking through flight trajectories of similar balloons), we estimated that our balloon achieved an altitude of about 93000 feet before returning to the earth. The balloon’s ascent took about 4 hours, and its descent took 40 minutes.
 Earth from 93000 feet. Long Island in the background.
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 Glowing from the sun
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 Our balloon popped at around 93000 feet, beginning its 40 minute descent
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 The falling balloon
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[...] Astfel, au reusit sa cumpere un aparat foto, un balon, un GPS si alte cateva componente pentru suma de 148 de dolari. Apoi au asamblat totul intr-un dispozitiv care a ajuns la 28 km in spatiu si a facut o poza. Au recuperat dispozitivul dupa cateva ore, de la o distanta de aproximativ 30 de km. Pozele le gasiti aici. [...]
Amazing!!!! oO
[...] http://space.1337arts.com/flight a few seconds ago from Gwibber [...]
thats savage! i’d love to try that some day!
[...] packets to keep the electronics operating at low temperatures. Head over to 1337arts for the flight pics & [...]
Awesome, guys! We all witness here what passion, creativity and perseverance can establish! A great project which gives people a big smile and a good feeling in strange and sometimes hard times. Thanks!
Greetings from The Netherlands, Anthony.
On “Earth from 93000 feet” is there a possible ufo??? ¬¬
That’s really cool, just wonder if it couldn’t have caused a plane crash! You deserve an A for this for sure.
WOW!! Great guys! But.. no UFOS there?!?!?!
N.A.S.A is up there own ass. They need more common sense type intelligence like you mugs.
Congratulations gentlemen!!!
Amazing feat. Love the images.
How did the camera came back to earth? parachute? and how could it take picture of balloon exploding when camera is below balloon?
thanks in advance for your answer,
Raul
Took pictures every 5 seconds?
Make a time lapse video of it!
Using transcode. (open source)
$ ls DCM*.JPG > imagelist.txt
$ transcode -x imlist,null -y ffmpeg,null -F mpeg4 –use_rgb -i imagelist.txt -o timelapse.ffmpeg -w 8000 –import_asr 1 -g 640×480 -z -k
Upload it to vimeo or youtube.
Yea that’s COOL and all, but can you publish the Project Plans so Even a Cal-Tech student could build it?
Great experiment, it will be an inspiration for Science Fair kids all over the world.
Suggestions for next time: use hydrogen instead of helium, much better lifting capacity and it’s flammability is much over-rated. Make sure the balloon is totally empty before filling, keep all ignition sources well away and keep the filled balloon 2m or so above you so in the very unlikely event of ignition, all the hot gases make a beeline for the top of the atmosphere, well out of harm’s way.
For tracking it might also be possible to have telescope equipped observers triangulating the flight. Suspend the parachute 5m beneath the payload (far enough below it doesn’t interfere with photography) where it will open and slow the assent.
I’d dearly love to try it myself, but with our narrow landmass and capricious weather here in New Zealand it would be very easy to lose everything out to sea.
CONGRATULATIONS from Austria – that´s the American Spirit.
Trying to put your amazing story on http://www.tierarztblog.com
[...] packets to keep the electronics operating at low temperatures. Head over to 1337arts for the flight pics & details. [via [...]
[...] grosso: di recente il team Icarus del MIT di Boston ha dimostrato il contrario riuscendo a scattare fotografie incredibili del pianeta con un pallone costruito unicamente con materiali reperibili in commercio, e spendendo [...]
fantastic; nasa & co need millions of $ for the same result, greetings from austria, CMK
Please can someone tell or how they got a picture of the falling baloon and the baloon popping in space?
I assume that the parachute has been deployed in that photo and has slowed down the payload enough that the popped balloon has fallen in front of the camera.
Congratulations from Hungary, you’re great