MIT Students Take Pictures from Space on $150 Budget

[makc]

if you missed it on CNN

[Chris Peterson]

if you missed it on CNN :)

Not to take away from their achievement, which is impressive, but they took their pictures from a height of 18 miles. That doesn't come remotely close to any definition of "space" (normally between 50 and 80 miles). 18 miles is barely into the stratosphere; there are aircraft that fly that high.

[harry]

G'day


All I can say is good on them.

Darn I wished I thought of it.

So simple and yet effective.

This will give ideas to some money making people.

[makc]

This will give ideas to some money making people.

ha ha, weren't you saying you own large factory with many people working there, or something along these lines? I guess it's your turn to send camera to space now

[harry]

G'day

MakC, mate I will send one of the workers on a ballon.

That reminds me:

That has been done in the USA with many ballons holding up a chair.

[rstevenson]

That has been done in the USA with many ballons holding up a chair.

No, that was an Australian movie a few years back called Danny Deckchair. But the movie may have been based on Larry Lawnchair from L.A., if his story isn't apocryphal.

[ There's a scene in Danny Deckchair where he scans the heavens, so this is on topic. ]

Rob

[harry]

G'day

I think it was Larry's lawn chair from LA.

I will look it up.

[harry]

G'day

Lawnchair Larry, the Man Who Soared to 16,000 Feet Attached to Weather Balloons-Truth!
http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/l/ ... rlarry.htm

According to published reports, Walters was employed as a truck driver in Southern California. On July 2, 1982, he fastened 42 surplus balloons to a lawn chair and launched from his girlfriend's San Pedro home. He carried various supplies with him as well as a CB radio and a BB gun to shoot balloons one at a time to descend. He didn't realize how powerful the buoyancy of the balloons was. When he cut a rope holding him to terra firma, he took off with such a jolt that another anchor rope broke under the stress and he shot upward so quickly that his eyeglasses flew to the ground. He floated around the L.A. basin for several hours and reached altitudes of up to 16,000 feet. According to an article in the New York Times the next day, Walters was spotted by pilots from both TWA and Delta Airlines. It was cold at 16,000 feet and he started shooting some of his balloons to descend, but dropped his BB gun and had to wait for his rig to come down on its own. He landed in a residential neighborhood in Long Beach where got tangled in some power lines, causing a power blackout. He told reporters that his weather balloon flight had been a dream of more than 20 years. Larry Walters died eleven years after his flight from what the Los Angeles Times described as a self-inflected gunshot wound.

[rstevenson]

Truth is stranger than fiction!

Rob

[bystander]

They recreated Lawn Chair Larry's flight on
Discovery TV's MythBusters third pilot episode.

Lawn Chair Larry: News Clip and Documentary

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW5ZLFHTwLc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-rKcqOK5qU

2008 Oregon Copycat: Kevin Couch

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MUegI0WLn8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20TKAIBKyEk

[harry]

G'day Bystander

Thank you for those videos.