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[UPDATE 10/23/11
Thank you to everyone who has looked at our project! The response has
been completely overwhelming. We were itching to launch another one
but after seeing the feedback, it makes us that much more excited to
get it done. The next launch will be about 2 weeks from now, and that payload will
have a video camera along for the ride as well! We've sorted out all the issues we had on this run, so all the images
should be usable. Thank you again for all of the support and stay
tuned for more images in the future!]
This is what space looks like from a weather balloon. We're working on determining exactly what altitude we got to, but I'd put it somewhere near 100,000 feet.
You can see about half of the city of Lubbock along the bottom of the photo just right of center.
We launched our little spacecraft (Cygnus) at 9:02am from 33° 49' 28"N 102° 53' 56"W, and it touched back down to Earth at 11:56am at 33° 19' 21"N 101° 59' 42"W. 62 miles from where it was released. This image was taken 1 hour and 55 minutes into the flight.
The camera was traveling in a styrofoam beer cooler from Wal Mart. The cooler was lifted into space using a 22 foot weather balloon filled with Helium. A parachute was attached to the cooler to slow and stabilize the fall of the cooler when the balloon eventually popped from lack of air pressure as it rose closer to the vacuum of space.
There were some issues with frost building up on the plexiglass shield and it actually ruined most of the images. Live and learn I suppose. We'll get it down next time. Most people we've seen do this online take 3-6 months of planning and preparation before they launch something. We did it in 13 days. I guess it's only fitting that we overlooked something. I'm just glad we found it and everything was still in one piece!
Because there was so much issue with frost, I did my best to remove it from this image. It made the curve of the Earth a little bumpy in the left half of the image, but you can see what it should look like toward the right edge.
Check out a video of the balloon being released here!
UPDATE 10/19/11
We made the local news! So awesome. Check out the story here. (I'll update this link if I get a higher quality video)
Charles Henry, All Too Real, and 218 other people added this photo to their favorites.
View 20 more comments
ABrush 20 months ago | reply
WOW 太Coooool了
© Freddie 20 months ago | reply
Brilliant!
mrvegas99_99 20 months ago | reply
Good job guys!
damianvines 20 months ago | reply
Fantastic, can't wait till the 2nd!!
Ivana Badalotti 20 months ago | reply
amazing!!! good work!!!
charlesjudyboyd 20 months ago | reply
Did you dod the commerial? Great job!
BAKINGSLEY 20 months ago | reply
Superb work
rhoy185 19 months ago | reply
Awesome!
Eville93 19 months ago | reply
Really interesting!!
blfingers1 19 months ago | reply
Amazing pictures!! A little American ingenuity goes way out in space. Glad you are trying again.
knife dude 19 months ago | reply
america needs guys like you.......people who fiigure it out and get results.........hope to see more in the future.............
joekrick 19 months ago | reply
"I say it's about time this was done by the "layman" ..Awesome! Good work and it did not cost the taxpayers trillions of dollars! WOO HOO!
Psykotiq 19 months ago | reply
yeah the sad thing is they do this same exact thing in a TV COMMERCIAL
Erich Leeth 18 months ago | reply
Thank you for all the comments and support everyone! We're really looking forward to launching another camera, but we need help! It's no easy feat for poor college students! Check out the new link at the top of this page and consider helping us out. Thank you again for checking this out!
Gwyrosydd 17 months ago | reply
This is such a good project guys
Cristiano Secci 16 months ago | reply
Great experience guys! You made it into space! Looking forward to see your next attempts! :-)
Mundus Gregorius 14 months ago | reply
This is indeed high. Amazing shot !
FiRe Photography 12 months ago | reply
fantastic shot and view, wow!
melissamethamphetamine [deleted] 10 months ago | reply
This is my favorite from the set, great work, great capture, can't wait for more!
Rafael PFA 8 months ago | reply
woow