Preparing
the payload that will be attached to a weather balloon. The balloon carried a
cooler containing a camera, 60,000 to 90,000 feet in the air in an attempt to
capture photos of the curvature of the Earth, the thin veil of its atmosphere
and the darkness of space.
Randy Edelman, a technology education teacher
at the Philipsburg-Osceola area junior high school in Pennsylvania, came up
with the idea after reading about students at MIT who accomplished a similar
experiment. Edelman planned the project with Seth Wilberding, a doctoral
student from Pennsylvania State University who volunteers at the school one day
a week through a National Science Foundation partnership.
In the classroom, Edelman had his
students calculate how the altitude, pressure and climate would affect the rate
of ascent and descent of the balloon. Then the group placed a Canon digital
camera inside a Styrofoam cooler and surrounded it with newspaper and hand
warmers to keep the electronics warm at 90,000 feet, where temperatures can go
below 50 degrees Fahrenheit. The camera was programmed to take photos every 12
seconds. They painted the cooler bright orange so it would be easier to spot
and attached a parachute to it for safe landing.
The cooler was launched on a windy day
from the high-school baseball field in Philipsburg. It stayed aloft for 72
minutes, after which it landed about 90 miles away in the town of Newport,
between Lewistown and Harrisburg. Edelman was able to safely retrieve the
cooler from its landing spot in a tree 70 feet in the air.
The experiment was a success, yielding
388 pictures, some of which were snapped at 60,000 to 90,000 feet--two or three
times as high as planes fly. Other shots included aerial views of Interstate
99, U.S. Route 322, Philipsburg, State College and other local landmarks.
Edelman funded most of the project with
a $500 education grant from the McDonalds Corporation. (Date of Images: June
2011)
Credit:
Philipsburg-Osceola School District.
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