Slashdot Mirror
More on High-Altitude Balloonists
An anonymous reader writes "The Guardian reports on an attempt at the record for the highest balloon flight. 'A bag of helium the size of the Empire State building to challenge Nasa record.'" We had an article about them a few months ago.
how long you could speak in a high-pitched voice from that one! And they waste it to fly around, pfff..
Of course it runs NetBSD. BTC: 1NT7QvbetmANwaMzhpVL6
their lives will depend on exquisitely accurate weather forecasts
They're doomed.
sh'aped as King Kong.
Please.
Going a long way straight up is not the same as going in to orbit!
<fnord>OBEY</fnord>
...to pack a pellet gun and a brown-bag lunch. After the balloon comes down (after crossing LAX's approach path, of course), the lawn chair used for the flight will be up for auction on eBay.
This sig is offered AS-IS, with no warranty express or implied. Risk of using this sig rests entirely with the user.
Worth noting that the ballon is so large that once airborne it will be visible over a radius of some 600 miles. Its being launched on the south coats of cornwall so most of England, Ireland and Wales and Northern France will be able to see it.
I bet the bastards launch at night though....
-- "Can't sleep, clowns will eat me!"
Their claims are full of hot air.
Someone was gonna say it. You know it.
I assert that my comment is only my opinion, not that of any employer, past, present or future.
The real high-altitude balloon record-holder, surprisingly, was not mentioned in this article.
There's a Mercedes gap too. I want one and can't afford one, but it's not government's job to do anything about it.
other than the fact that they are going to be moving at 1000 ft/s, and the fact that they are going to be exposed to temperatures WELL below what any human should desire, nevermind their strange choice to rely heavily on accurate weather reports, why would you think this is crazy?
The interesting thing, too me at least, is seeing
the curvature of the earth. When I was a functionally
check flight weapon systems officer for the F-4E some
years ago, I used to see the curvature of the Earth at
50,000 feet. And now, we didn't use pressure suits...
"The two adventurers need cloudless skies, high pressure, gentle winds and a 72-hour forecast in which they can be confident." ..and they're flying from SW England?!!!
--
This sig is inoffensive.
At about 44,000ft, you need to be wearing a pressure suit, because if not the blood will start to heat and actually boil.
It's my understanding that the blood wouldn't actually heat, it would boil because of the lack of pressure. Am I wrong?
"We have done some pretty vivid demonstrations of putting half a pint of water in a decompression chamber and decompressing it to 100,000ft and the water boils and explodes in less than half a second, just disappears. It's scary stuff,"
And this is just scary??
I really hope their pressured suite are going to keep them safe from this....or we will see a really bad picture at their return....
Is anyone beside me asking himself if this adventure is just worth the risk?
Apple iProduct. Non importa cosa sia, lo comprerete!
As the balloon rises the atmosphere gets less dense, hence it rises slower. This is why the balloon is so large to enable _some_ lift at 25 miles. This is still not high enought for satellites which are in the 00s of miles altitude.
So it can't replace the shuttle or rockets.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
as an assist for a conventional rocket?
I wrote a letter to Aerostar, the largest commercial hotair balloon manufacturer in the States, about their largest model, the Aero 245 asking about maximum payload and altitude and I never heard back.
But I did find that they were only around 75 grand a piece. What I was wondering was if you took like five of those to say 40,000 feet towing a rocket and then launched from there, wouldn't you be able to get a lot more bang for your buck than from say a similar operation using a customized jet airliner that costs millions to modify and operate?
I mean this high altitude stunt stuff is cool and all, but I'm very curious as to why balloons can't be a practical element in launching satellites and such.
They're ascending at 1000ft/min with a balloon the size of the Empire State Building, which is as thin as a freezer bag. So one bird strike and they're done right?
According to the article the fabric is rather delicate - strong winds are enough to cancel the flight. I don't know whether or not this particular fabric is a design requirement but the way things are right now I don't think I'd want a rocket going off anywhere nearby.
No, but if you knew anything at all about chemistry or physics, you'd realize that as the pressure decreases, a liquid can boil even if the temperature stays the same.
That being said, I don't think the water in your blood will actually vaporize at that altitude. However, nitrogen will start to come out of solution and form bubbles in your bloodstream.
they climb into their Russian spacesuits, strap themselves into their cockpit chairs, slowly inflate the biggest balloon ever made, and float towards the heavens
New Mexico (CNN):
Late this evening, a tumbleweed farmer reported what appeared to be a crashed alien spacecraft, complete with a cockpit populated by a pair of extraterrestrial pilots squawking at each other [about using a cell phone around massive amounts of helium] before the farmer shot them with his shotgun. The silverish spacecraft and pilot bodies were quickly carted off by Area 51 personnel.
The technique is called
rockoon
and is often used for altitude records.
However, its utility for getting into orbit is somewhat less, as all a rockoon gets you is above some of the air resistance - to get to orbit requires speed, not just alititude.
www.eFax.com are spammers
The contenders for the 2003 darwin awards are...
Want Ad
-------
Wanted 2 open minded people willing to create scientific history by piloting the world's largest craft to record setting heights. See beautiful scenery of the Earth and heavens not seen by most people.
Fine print
----------
The high-tech craft is really a giant thin walled helium balloon with a small gondola
Inaccurate weather forecast may kill you
Oxygen will be forced into your lungs
Your blood may boil
Your blood may vaporize
You must withstand the terror of impending death for at least 12 hours
Spacesuit made in Russia.
Solid 'low-residue' foods must be consumed before flight
If everything is not perfect, death arrives within 30 seconds.
We are an equal opportunity employer. All are encouraged to apply. Principles only. Do not bring lawyers.
--- I'm Green Hornet's sidekick not Inspector Clouseau's!
Bear in mind that their skin and all those other solid bits actually does contribute a bit to maintaining the pressure of e.g. their blood.
This has been borne out by experiments with primates and a few decompression accidents with humans.
Yes, decompression would still kill them, but mostly just as a consequence of asphyxiation (albeit accompanied by very painful swelling). They certainly won't explode.
While they still might look a bit grotesque, there needn't be any worries about having to crack the suits and ladle the corpses into buckets afterwards or anything like that.
DNA just wants to be free...
nasa say that this would not happen and that you can survive for upto a half a minute without ill effects. "You do not explode and your blood does not boil because of the containing effect of your skin and circulatory system. You do not instantly freeze because, although the space environment is typically very cold, heat does not transfer away from a body quickly."
You aren't going to get big payloads into space this way as the heavy balloons can carry on the order of several tons. I'm not sure if, in the end, this would be any cheaper or easier than launching a Pegasus from an airplane.
One thing certainly would be neat is if they used hygrogen in the balloon, that would make quite an impressive fireball then the rocket is ignited.
"However, by diving or "standing up" in free fall, any experienced skydiver can learn to reach speeds of over 160-180MPH. Speeds of over 200MPH require significant practice to achieve. The record free fall speed, done without any special equipment, is 321MPH. Obviously, it is desirable to slow back down to 110MPH before parachute opening."
- http://hypertextbook.com/facts/JianHuang.shtml
How did he get enough speed to break the sound barrier? He would have needed a jet to speed his descent or something like that.
|
After checking out their site for a while, I have come to the conclusion that this project is relying on a lot of luck. I work for NASA's Balloon Program Office, and we fly balloons of this size and bigger. For one, this project has their balloon being made by a manufacturer that doesnt make balloons. Balloons of this size are a QA nightmare. Having miles of load tape and polyethylene, they are very hard to manufacture and test. Polyethylene is the same stuff they make sandwich baggies out of, very delicate.
I really have no clue why they wouldn't order their balloon from the same place most people interested in this sort of thing do, Raven Industries. Maybe they didnt have the dough. We don't fly people on our balloons, just huge science payloads in the range of 5-7000 pounds. I wish these guys the best, but I really beleive they are insane.
StickMan
www.rageagainst.net
A bag of helium the size of the Empire State building
Teddy Kennedy is working for NASA now?
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
The website for the attempt is at QinetiQ 1
Its worthwhile noting that they will launch from the back of a trimaran warship research vessel, and will be observed from the highest flying powered, tethered UAV ever.
So it will demonstrate a whole slew of new technologies, real Slashdot stuff.