Chair floated up into upper atmosphere

[Ashliana]

Thought this was awesome: Toshiba, promoting a new LCD, floated up a lightweight chair and video camera attached to a balloon and filmed the results:

http://socialnews.toshiba.co.uk/?ReleaseID=14262

(Direct YouTube link: here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6PSbUl_68k&feature=player_embedded)).

[Back]

Great, more junk in space to destroy our space shuttles.

[Parkbandit]

Great, more junk in space to destroy our space shuttles.

Reading IS fun, duh, mental... you should give it a try:


Four independent GPS systems were placed on the rig to accurately record its height at any second to within 4 meters in altitude, and within 30cm in longitude and latitude position. This information was transmitted every 15 seconds back to ground control where it was monitored via a computer satellite system to enable the team to locate the rig once it had fallen back to earth.

[CrystalTears]

Space and technology are full of win.

This was really neat, thanks for sharing. :)

[Back]

Reading IS fun, duh, mental... you should give it a try:

Hey man, don’t get all rainbow on my piss parade!

Fricking hippie.

[Suppa Hobbit Mage]

Gotta admit, pretty badass.

[Methais]

Anything having to do with space rocks.

I wonder if Tsin is gonna do anything with his astronomy college major.

[Fallen]

The chair took 83 minutes to reach an altitude of 98,268 feet where it broke and took just 24 minutes to fall back down to earth with the rig.

Anyone know why the chair would break? They said it was -90 degrees up as high as it went, though I wouldn't see why it would cause the chair to break.

[BriarFox]

Anyone know why the chair would break? They said it was -90 degrees up as high as it went, though I wouldn't see why it would cause the chair to break.

Not really sure, but it's possible that the chair was wood, which contains a bit of water. Perhaps at that temperature the water in the wood froze, expanded, and shattered the chair?

[Fallen]

Not really sure, but it's possible that the chair was wood, which contains a bit of water. Perhaps at that temperature the water in the wood froze, expanded, and shattered the chair?

That's a theory, anyway.

[pabstblueribbon]

Chair hating aliens.

They see me sitting. They be hatin'.

[Latrinsorm]

It looks like wood and orange padding, but at the end of the clip it looks like the chair slams into the camera (solar wind? micrometeroite?). It's also conceivable that the glue or whatever was holding the chair together isn't well-suited to decompression and freezing.

[Suppa Hobbit Mage]

At the height it was, there is no atmosphere, so no air resistance and it attained a terminal velocity it could not in an atmosphere. When it reached the atmosphere, it was like hitting water... that's my understanding.

[Bobmuhthol]

It didn't come close to reaching a point of no atmosphere, but there was certainly less air pressure at that height.

[Sean of the Thread]

It was made out of balsa wood and weighed less than 4lbs...

[Showal]

I got this from another article:

Starting at 8ft in diameter, the balloon lifted the armchair over 82 minutes to a height of 98,268ft (18.6 miles) by which time the low pressure meant the balloon had increased to 24ft before finally shattering like glass, which you see at the end of the ad, allowing the broken seat and cameras to fall back to Earth.

[Swami71]

For $150 you too can take your own space pictures.

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/09/the-150-space-camera-mit-students-beat-nasa-on-beer-money-budget?

Video (http://space.1337arts.com/)

[Sean of the Thread]

Awesome.

[Deathravin]

Great, more junk in space to destroy our space shuttles.Reading IS fun, duh, mental... you should give it a try:

I hope you were being facetious, Back. If not, you need a physics class or ten.

If we could put things into orbit with balloons, why does the shuttle have big fuckin rockets on it? Lets just say it were possible for the balloon could make it half way to the moon. Since it lacks the speed required for orbit, the pieces would just fall back to earth anyway... Space junk has enough speed for orbit, and is an unfortunate and currently mostly unavoidable consequence of sending things into space (The main exception of course would be China blowing up one of their satellites to 'see if they can do it' - thanks a LOT China!).