MECSAT

Medgar Evers College, City University of New York

Condor 2—7/17/04

Description

This flight was launched at Milton High School in Milton. The winds aloft were fairly mild. The maximum wind speed was 39 mph at an altitude of about 39,000 feet. The winds were mostly from the SW but at 60,000 shifted and were from the SE and then E. We were concerned about a landing in Canadian and came pretty close - our payload was retrieved less than 1,000 feet from the Canadian border. The launch was delayed because of heavy traffic from Canada and/or nearby interference blocking our transmissions. We resolved the problem by flying "deaf". We tracked the balloon to about 45,000 feet, about 20 miles NE of our launch site. Subsequent testing suggests that tracking problems with this and flight may have been due to setting the radio to low power or not checking to see if the APO function was turned disabled. Fortunately, our payload was recovered near Richford, VT. The parachute caught in a tree and the payload had a soft landing. All cables, etc. were still attached and our flying lunchbox looked none the worse for the trip.

 

Launch Information

           Launch Date: 7/17/2004

           Launch Site: Milton High School,

                Milton, VT

           Launch Coordinates: 44.62855,-73.11821

           Elevation: ~300 feet

           Balloon: Kaysam 1200 gram

           Ascent rate: ~550 feet/min

           Burst Altitude: Approximated using balloon

                size, estimated free lift and ascent rate -

                75-80,000 feet

           Callsign: KC2NAZ-11

 

Payloads

           Communications:

           Vertex VX-150, TinyTrak3 and Garmin GPS  

            Etrex Legend receiver

            Frequency: 144.39Mhz

            Secondary: in same payload (from 

            U.Vermont/Milton HS partners):

            -CricketSAT internal temperature

            Frequency: 434Mhz

           -Chirping cricket audio with flashing strobes