The eighth grade enrichment program at Springville-Griffith Institute Middle School offers students a choice of one-period classes that are not graded, giving them the opportunity and motivation to learn more about subjects of personal interest.
This stratosphere balloon project was modeled after a similar experiment completed by MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) students last spring. About 40 S-GI students worked on the project after three weeks of planning and experimentation that involved social studies, English, math, science and technology teachers.
The goal was to launch a weather balloon that would reach the stratosphere, 17 miles up and to bring it down with photographic proof. The students researched GPS software, camera programming and weather patterns.
A refurbished digital camera was purchased and Ben Higgins, district technology integrator and Andrew Przybycien, BOCES technology specialist, were able to obtain and install some special software. The camera was capable of taking a photo every six seconds for about eight hours.
The students were able to see their capsule’s altitude, speed and direction on a computer screen, then the “chase crew” was able to find it when it landed.
Joseph Karb, social studies teacher, noted that the parachute and cooler were tested by dropping them from the Middle School roof.
The weather balloon was inflated with helium to a diameter of five feet. A parachute and cooler capsule were attached below. In the stratosphere, the balloon expanded until it broke and once that shredded, the parachute took over and brought the capsule safely back to earth.
It was found undamaged in a farmer’s field north of Batavia in Elba.
Prior to the 8:50 a.m. launch on November 18, Karb had contacted the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) in Atlanta for approval of the design. The Buffalo tower was contacted one hour before the launch, in the event any aircraft were in Springville’s airspace.
Airborne for about three hours, the capsule camera took 2,100 photos. Many of those have been posted on the S-GI Web site at www.springvillegi.org/webpages/jkarb/stratosphere.cfm .
MIT launched their capsule for $150. S-GI paid $225. The Middle School Student Council donated funds toward the project as did several teachers. A parent donated the tank of helium.
Working with their teachers at the launch site were Anthony Paluch, Dylan Nelson, Joshua Gernold, Gregory Beatty, Zachary Kontos, Chelsea Slippy and Lindsey Shelley. They were interviewed, with Karb, by WGRZ-TV who aired a news segment about the launch on November 18 along with the “Kids 2 Day” program on November 21.
“We couldn’t buy just one balloon, we had to buy two. So we are planning a different experiment with the second one,” Karb added.
Student motivation and sense of accomplishment hit the stratosphere with their capsule.
“I learned how much air expands when it goes 17 miles into the air. It felt so cool – it was interesting that we could launch a camera almost into space,” Kontos commented.
“I learned how to measure to make the capsule lighter or heavier to get the balloon in the air, along with mapping and tracking,” Slippy said. “We had a successful launch just like MIT and they are college students; we’re middle school students but we did it.”