A day and something ago (what even is time?), late on Sunday morning, SuperBIT launched! On a Super Pressure Balloon from beautiful Wanaka, New Zealand. I have had few moments in between where I haven’t been frantic or grabbing a bit of precious sleep. So far things appear to be working well, and the balloon seems healthy. More to come. This news article contains a NASA video from the launch. […]
The final major technical hurdle before SuperBIT can launch was its April 3 Compatiblity test. We rolled outside and connected all of the balloon and satellite electronics to make sure everything worked together. It did. There was also a little bit of final preparation to do beforehand, mainly finishing up the DRSes (Data Recovery Systems), which are essentially hard drives on parachutes that we can use for “high bandwidth downlink”. SuperBIT being fully assembled outside also provides a good photo opportunity, so lots of people came outside to pose with it. The test passed fine, and we then started to wait for a potential launch day that checks all the weather and safety boxes. Our first such potential day is here, and I write this in a short gap between preparations. […]
I discovered that Wanaka has a camera shop with same-day film processing, so I asked Bill bring my Nikon FM with him. After barely shooting on it for a while, I made it my goal for the partial day off Sunday to finish off my test roll of the Lomo film. I walked along the Clutha River near where I’m staying in Albert Town, outside Wanaka. It’s starting to be noticeably early fall here and getting colourful. A nice time to have colour film loaded. […]