Lincoln Park Middle School Launches Weather Balloon

DULUTH, Minn. – “It was awesome, it was super fun. I got to go out of class and launch a balloon into outer space,” Lincoln Park Middle School 8th Grade Student, Zelalem Oestreich said.

8th graders in a pre-engineering class at Lincoln Park Middle School took part in a Weather Balloon project that teaches about temperature, humidity, pressure, and other information as it travels through the stratosphere.

“It’s fun, I mean I get excited for every launch and I would imagine the students are really excited as well. So, it’s really cool to see something launch. I mean who doesn’t want to go to like an airplane launch or watch a spacecraft go off or something like that and so this is kind of a tame version of that. There’s no flames it’s just helium,” Weather Balloon Project Organizer, Dave Johnson said.

The project involves inflating a 600 gram balloon with helium and then launching it into the sky. It will travel up roughly 30 thousand meters or about 15 miles high and if calculations are correct, eventually land over in Wisconsin.

“I was really expecting the balloon to go much slower than that because this is my second balloon launch that I’ve done here at Lincoln because this is like a thing that they kind of do sometimes. And, I was not expecting it to go up super fast,” Oestreich said.

Attached to the balloon is a platform containing a series of computers as well as additional science experiments students have individually placed.
The platform is also equipped with GPS and radio tracking equipment as well as video cameras.

“It feels very successful like it feels like you actually did something and now will get the satisfaction of having our lovely DJ over here come and bring it back and we get to see all of the photos and all of the videos and all of that stuff,” says Oestreich.

Once the balloon lands, the students will be able to study the data the computers collected.

“I hope they learn something about the atmosphere. I hope they learn about how thin it is compared to how big our earth is and how precious it is, I hope they would learn that. I hope they learn just how science can be really fun and exciting and maybe engaging. And, maybe it will give them an idea like, “Oh, well maybe I can do something like that, maybe I could work for NASA, maybe I could work for McDonald Douglas.” Who knows?” Johnson said.

At 9 AM on Thursday, Marshall School will be conducting their own weather balloon launch.