[VIDEO BELOW]
NASA has launched hundreds of missions into space over the decades. But this one is a little different, as it was orchestrated by an amateur rocketeer and his peers. Landon McCoy and the team at the Engineering Club at Arnold High School attached a GoPro camera to a high-altitude weather balloon, and… well… they launched it into space.
The footage their camera captured along the two-hour journey to reach 90,000 feet miles above the Earth is stunning, to say the least.
“This was one of the most fun projects I’ve ever gotten the chance to work on,” said McCoy. “It took my team at Arnold High School Engineering Club about four months of planning and preparation, but it was a fantastic learning experience. It’s so cool to see the view of the gulf and gorgeous Florida shoreline expand as the balloon increases in altitude.”
McCoy said the total cost of the project was only around $500.
“All it really takes is a weather balloon, helium, parachute, foam cooler, rope, GoPro, and GPS tracker,” he said. “Gulf Coast State College provided the launch location and extra hands, and the rangers out at St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge helped us get the GoPro back after it landed there about two and a half hours away.”
Check out this extraordinary footage the GoPro captured along its journey:
Panhandle from space. Awesome ???? i????
Posted by Martin Kyle on Sunday, 31 July 2022
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