Flight of the King, MkIII

On November 15th 2008, the Lanark Space Agency (aka: LaSA), in cooperation with the Lanark/North Leeds Amateur Radio Emergency Service (aka: LNLARES), launched their third high altitude balloon experiment. They had hoped to achieve a new world record, but fell short by about 3,000 feet. Everything went extremely well for the launch and the eventual recovery of the payload package. Here is the story.

Here are some stats from the event:

Balloon call sign VE3REX-11

APRS Microtracker 1 watt in flight. 6 watts on the ground

Amateurs:

VE3XNT Mission Control Comms ,VE3GWS Mission Control APRS ,VA3KAI Comms equipment, VE3BSB APRS manager and chase, VA3ZBO Mission Comander and chase, VA3ZKS Education and chase, VE3MW The Man from the North Pole, VA3QA Down Range comms and APRS tracking, VE3JGL Chase and ground tracking , Additional tracking data from VE3BSM and K1HJC

Many other amateurs on hand to witness the event.

Flight Times: Lift off 14.12 z , Burst altitude 16.23z, Landing 16.57z, Recovered 18:45z, Distance 168 Miles, Altitude 122,889 ft.

Click a Thumbnail for a full size picture.

From: Marc Baillon, Teacher at the Perth Montessori School.

This mission is a great way to discuss the atmosphere, floatation, wind patterns and the Jet Stream, optics, radio communications...you name it. You can access mission info at http://www.greatballoonchase.ca.

SUCCESS: I'm pleased to report the Lanark Space Agency (LaSA) balloon mission (LaSA MkIII) was a success. We achieved an altitude of 37,284m (122,323 feet), which was unfortunately shy of the new world record but puts our little homegrown team in second place!

THE MISSION: Once released, the balloon quickly picked up speed as it was carried along by the Jet Stream. The balloon reached speeds of 233kph! Once above the Jet Stream it slowed right down, giving chase vehicles a chance to catch up. After the burst, somewhere near Maxville, Ontario, it freefell quickly until the parachute could deploy in the thicker atmosphere. As it floated down, the Jet stream got hold of it again and sent it North-East across the Ottawa river and into Western Quebec. It landed North West of Lachute in some dense bush....in a cut-line! Another lucky landing location. It could easily have snagged in 100 foot pine tree!

RECOVERY: So the payload and its precious contents were recovered and hundreds of photos (many stunning) were retrieved. The camera was taking 6 photos a minute (every 30 secs it would take three shots, one metered and one above and one below by 1.5 stops). PHOTOS AND TRACK: Check out one of the photos at our website http://www.greatballoonchase.ca. From there you can also check out the path of the balloon. If you click on any of the red dots, you will get information about speed, altitude, and direction of traveL. If you have Google Earth at home, you can access a page with links to photos taken by our payload camera. Go here: http://suprdelux.com/LASA-Balloon/2008-11-15/ We had a great time sending our payload into near space, I hope you enjoyed watching or hearing about it! Cheers,

The day before:

We launch our helium filled balloon at 9 am EST (14Z for you military folks) Saturday 15 November (sorry for the short notice...). This launch is a world altitude record attempt!! We are trying to beat some engineers over at Lockheed-Martin who set the mark of 125,449 ft back in May '08. We have our most sophisticated camera and lightest payload yet, our biggest balloon (it will burst when it reaches 13m in diameter!!), our most precise pre-launch data and measurements, and our most confident launch team. The weather doesn't look the best however, heavy rain is predicted. Our fingers are crossed. You can track our flight in real-time and in 3D through our Website at www.greatballoonchase.ca. >From there you will be linked to a global HAM radio network (http://aprs.fi/) which projects radio transmissions onto Google Earth. Follow along as our onboard radio transmits location, altitude and speed of our package. All the while our camera will be taking pictures of the upper atmosphere. The call-sign for our balloon is VE3REX-11. Hope you follow along! Marco