JustinHamel.com

MISSION SUCCESS!
This mission was a complete success. We are in complete shock over the pictures that our digital camera captured during the flight. You can view them below. If you would like to see how we prepared for this mission, please visit Near Space Adventure: Flight 2.

Special thanks:
We would like to thank a number of people who helped make this flight a success:

1. Our families
2. Our friends
3. Jeff Smith at Airgas
4. The kind family who allowed us to launch from their property and helped us tremendously with the launch preparations.

Other thoughts:
It’s obvious by looking at the photos that we finally reached our goals. Not only did we definitely reach 100k feet, but we also managed to photograph the earth from an altitude that really allows the viewer to see the curvature of our beautiful earth.

We approached this opportunity to launch thinking that we had tied up every lose end. In reality, we learned some lessons the hard way. Example: Launching in the rain is not pleasant, and water-saturated objects such as parachutes weigh more than normal.

Flight pictures:
We have an unbelievable amount of photos from the “edge of space.” I’m still at a loss for words over these pictures. The quality of these photos has been adjusted for easy web viewing. If you would like a full-quality print, please comment below, and I will contact you. Enjoy!

[View with PicLens]

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Flight path:

Project goal:
To launch a weather balloon that lifts our payload to 100,000 feet, and recover the payload safely back on earth.

Introduction:
On October 10, 2009 we launched a weather balloon from the Oregon coast with the goal of sending our payload to 100,ooo feet. We didn’t reach our goal, so we went back to the drawing board to improve upon our theories and methods. We believe that we have substantially more information than what we collected for the first attempt. Now we intend to launch another weather balloon with the same goals in mind.

If this is your first time reading, I highly encourage you to read the original project post and the results from the first launch as there is a lot of data that will not be repeated in this post.

Inventory:
1500 gram balloon – http://kaymont.com
Parachute – http://www.the-rocketman.com/recovery.html
Payload container – http://www.mrboxonline.com/8x6x425-small-foam-coolers-p-675.html
GPS tracking unit – http://findmespot.com/en/index.php
Canon A470 digital camera – http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/A470
JVC Everio digital camcorder - http://www.jvc.com
Helium and gas bottle – http://www.airgas.com

Inventory notes:

1. We now intend to use a 1500 gram balloon.
2. We plan to add a digital video camera to the payload so that we can capture the entire flight.
3. Our payload is going to carry some artwork that will be exposed to the upper atmosphere at the request of the artist.

Expected launch date:
We will be launching on October 31, at 9 am. We are 100% sure that we are going to launch from (link removed).

Please come to our launch! I know that there are people who are following this blog that I have never met. Whether you are a friend, or a friend of a friend, coworker, or a meteorologist that wants to put us on TV…Everyone is invited.

I will be sure to post the address and the schedule for the launch prior to the launch date.

Launch data:
Our friends at EOSS (eoss.org) told us about a program called Liftwin. Liftwin is a program that calculates ballooning data based on input. So we can use this program to determine how we should go about achieving our current and future ballooning goals.

Unfortunately, Liftwin only runs on Windows 9.x operating systems (Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows ME).

To resolve this issue, I installed Sun VirtualBox. VirtualBox is a program that allows you to run an operating system within your existing operating system. Simply put, Windows 98 runs inside of its own window just like other programs do. VirtualBox is also cross-platform compatible, so Mac and Linux users can run it. This also means that Windows users can install Mac OSX or Linux in VirtualBox and run both at the same time.

I purposely blurred my desktop.

Since the weather always changes, it’s best to have multiple possible launch locations. Below is an example of what I think is the most plausible flight scenario based on the weather information that is available. We don’t want our payload to land in an area where it will be inaccessible. Farmland seems to be the best landing area.

Launch: Salem, OR -- Landing: Bend, OR

This particular flight path is based on the weather data for Oct. 20, 2009. If we could replicate this flight path on launch day, I would be extremely excited. We could take amazing photos and video from 60k-90k feet while traveling over the Three Sisters mountains.

UPDATES:

1. We are launching on October 31, 2009.
2. Instead of a 1200 gram balloon, we are going to launch a 1500 gram balloon. The 1500 gram balloon will be very large.

SUCCESS!!
We launched from Gearhart, Oregon at approximately 9:15 am on October 10, 2009. The balloon and payload rose to an unknown height, then landed about 65 miles down range. Amazingly, the payload returned to earth right about where we expected it to. We experienced the phenomenon of water changing state on the surface of the filter in most of our photos from the first attempt. However, I consider the first attempt a WIN! A passion is born!

Special thanks:

1. Thank you so much to our good friends for getting up early on a Saturday morning to help us retrieve the payload.
2. Thank you to our loved ones for tolerating our endless child-like enthusiasm for this project.
3. Thank you to Jeff Smith at Airgas on Columbia Blvd for all the wonderful data and the helium.

We could not have gotten this project off the ground without you!

Launch #2:
We expect to launch again within the month. With any luck (and math), we will be able to go even higher.

Please visit the original post for an overview on how we accomplished this fantastic first flight. http://justinhamel.com/2009/09/23/near-space-adventure/

If you would like to contact us for further information, please email me at justin@justinhamel.com.

[View with PicLens]

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Friends, please donate for our next launch.

Notes:

1. This project has caught the attention of some unexpected people. We now have a student artist (attending Reed) interested in exposing some of her art to the harsh environments of the upper atmosphere. Additionally, Mark Nelsen from Fox 12 is following our progress.
2. After some discussion, we believe that we filled our first balloon with too much helium. By overfilling the balloon with helium, we believe that we sacrificed some altitude. We now believe that the balloon and payload reached a height of approx 75k feet.