We have some exciting news from i4iS. In recent weeks a team has been in the planning to launch a balloon to high altitude, the mission was called Shackleton 2. The project was led by Sam Harrison and Daniel Parker. The mission was launched on Sunday from Enniskillen airport in Northern Ireland, after negotiating CAA launch approval, with the aim to take a ‘selfie’ of the external display at around 120,000 ft, the target altitude. We are pleased to report that the launch was a huge success and the balloon flew from Northern Ireland to Oxfordshire. The balloon drifted 100 miles off course but the team were able to recover it. The total flight time was around 3.5 hours.
The probe maxed out at 89,000 ft after a frozen helium fill line burst due to the extreme cold caused by the expanding gas which meant they couldn’t fill it up enough to reach its maximum height. The on-board electronic heating system they designed and built worked “like a charm” and kept their ipod fully working at minus 70 degrees Celsius. They did have a tracking link to the probe but the software failed and they couldn’t get that working. The i4iS logo was loaded onto the probe and was one of the images taken by Shackleton 2 before the camera battery ran out.
The probe went to 89,000 ft which is 27.13 km or 16.86 miles above sea level, which placed it firmly into the stratosphere, the second major layer of the Earth’s atmosphere just above the troposphere and below the mesosphere. The temperature at this height is around –50 degrees Celsius or 223.8 K and the pressure is around 20 millibars. The air density drops to 0.028 kg/cubic meter. The speed of sound drops from its sea level value of 340 m/s to 299.9 m/s. This is also the point in the atmosphere where the temperature is layered because ozone (o3) absorbs high energy uVB and UVC energy waves from the Sun and is broken down into atomic oxygen (O) and diatomic oxygen (O2). Atomic oxygen is found prevalent in the upper stratosphere due to the bombardment of UV light and the destruction of both ozone and diatomic oxygen. The mid stratosphere has les UV light passing through it, O and O2 are able to combine, and is where the majority of natural ozone is produced.
The height that the probe went to is above the altitude of commercial airliners (typically 30,000-39,000 ft) and is above the height that the supersonic jet Concorde would operate at (typically 59,000 ft). In addition, it is even above the height that the famous Lockheed SR-71 blackbird spy plane would cruise at (typically 85,000 ft).
A huge congratulations to Sam Harrison and his team. It may not be 4.4 light years away to our nearest star, but getting our logo to 89,000 ft has to count as a tangible starting point. The photos clearly show the i4iS logo with the curvature of the Earth in the background. Inspiration for the future.
The i4iS team are very excited about this achievement which shows we are starting to put our minds not just to theoretical advances, but real world tangible steps to the practical realisation of interstellar flight. Demonstrating transport through the atmosphere, and eventually beyond it, is an essential pre-requisite for any space aspiring team. Both Sam and Daniel, represent the spirit of our intention with this success.