Engineering, a class taught by Mr. Steepleton, is working on creating payloads to send up to space by balloon. The payloads include electronic sensors that are able to measure temperature, air pressure, and accelerometers to measure g force of the balloon.
The balloon will be sent into the stratosphere at around 100,000 feet above sea level before it pops, returns back to Earth, and students are able to observe the results.
However, this isn’t a typical Engineering class project. Littleton is collaborating with CU Boulder to help students study the unique conditions of space.
“Professor Matt Rhode, he’s an aerospace engineering professor at CU Boulder and we’ve become friends the past couple of months. He’s helped to consult with us with the new Career Exploration Center across the street. He does a freshman Engineering Design Projects class up there where students build small payloads that have electronic sensors on the inside,” said Mr. Steepleton.
“He’s done this project with his aerospace students for the last several years and this semester his class was a little smaller than normal so they had room for additional payloads to go up to space and so he invited us here at Littleton High School to tag along,” said Steepleton.
Mr. Steepleton describes his hopes for his students from this project.
“Sending something to space is a pretty unique opportunity in and of itself I’m hoping for them to see that they can create and design and build really anything they want to. There are resources all over the place, whether that’s CU Boulder’s aerospace program, or there’s another organization, Edge of Space, where the people actually send packages up to space. There are organizations all over the place that can help them accomplish whatever it is they want to learn,”
The balloon will be sent into space on April 8th, so keep an eye out for it if you get a chance!
