From TBFMania
We’ve seen [too] many amateur space shots already but one more cannot hurt, right?
Disposable takeout food container? Check.
Spray-on insulation? Check.
Borrowed (smart, eh) iPhone? Check. [The iPhone was loaded with InstaMapper, a free GPS tracking application that allowed the phone to act as a beacon for retrieving the balloon.]
Weather balloon. Check.
Helium supply? Check.
Luke Geissbühler is a director and cinematographer, and had been involved in research on weather balloon enthusiasts for a feature film. He decided to do the project at the request of his son, who had been lobbying for a homemade spacecraft. He explained that his son asks for the impossible, and after explaining why it is impossible, he then begins to question and investigate whether it really is impossible.
I wonder what the son would get as marks if he submitted this to his science teacher as a project?
Note to future amateur space astronauts: don’t forget to set your camera’s focus to infinity, if possible.
source physorg
And here’s a behind the scenes of an actual full ground to air launch and altitude sequence of a research weather balloon with a VadoHD video camera attached to it. How come no one ever told me about this career possibility: sending weather balloons up in space? Kids, talk to your school career counselor!
Note to weather scientists who send balloons into space as a job: next time, set your frame rate to a slight slow-motion frame rate so we don’t feel like we’re on Space Mountain.