Moose Jaw high school launches helium balloon to space

We have all let go of a helium balloon and watched it fly up up and away, but where does the balloon go?

Well the science department at Peacock Collegiate in Moose Jaw not only released a balloon, but they tracked it.

It’s the second time the high school has tracked a high altitude balloon in the name of science.

“What we wanted to do, is collect some real data about the atmosphere… So we got our hands on this high altitude weather balloon that we send up in to the atmosphere and it takes measurements of the temperatures, the altitude, wind speed and jet stream… Then kids can bring it down and go over the data and see the things we are learning about in text book for themselves,” Science Teacher Stephen Lys said.

“On the balloon there is a pay load that had a GPS receiver on it so we can track it. There is a little computer that takes measurements for us and there is a GoPro camera on it so we can take footage of the sky and the land and cloud patterns.”

The goal was to reach 1000 thousand feet, or about 20 miles.

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Still they were able to track the balloon, it’s made it’s way to Pinkie Road in Regina. Last year the balloon was tracked outside of Yorkton and it went up 70 thousand feet in the air.

“It gets high enough where you can see the curve of the earth and the darkness of space, the sky stops being blue anymore and it turns black,” Lys said.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "It gets high enough where you can see the curve of the earth and the darkness of space, the sky stops being blue anymore and it turns black," Lys said.

This year, the balloon was up in the air for over four hours, unfortunately the computer tracking the height of the balloon broke. Still students watching the launched had a blast watching.

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“It’s great to see go up, to see that it’s going to start here and go up way into space and back down,” Student Jaydon Patterson said.

“A balloon to space, I figured, that is right in my alley.”

Some students are already anxious for the re-launch in July.

“I would like to try launching the balloon that would be fun,” Student Logan Pockett said.