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KW weather balloon bursts

11/6/2007

By the Salina Journal

The weather balloon launched Saturday morning by the Kansas Wesleyan University Physics Club reached an altitude of 96,000 feet before it burst and its payload landed in Lyons County.

According to a press release from the college, Sue McDonald, chairman in KWU's Department of Mathematics and Physics, said the balloon carried a payload that included temperature probes, an accelerometer, a video camera and a GPS transmitter.

A portion of the club remained at Kansas Wesleyan to track the balloon via the Internet. The remainder followed in a van equipped with tracking equipment and its own GPS device.

The balloon came down in a field northwest of Emporia, just north of the Neosho River.

The balloon burst because as it rose, the pressure on the outside of the balloon lessened, causing the helium inside the balloon to expand. When it left the ground, it was about 8 feet in diameter; by the time it burst, it was about 30 feet in diameter.