JP Aerospace Blog

Looking for some non Covid drama for ad campaign or announcement? Space for your image available on the Away 131 high altitude balloon flight.

Check out Edge of Space Ads at the Dark Sky Market:

https://dark-sky-market.myshopify.com/collections/image-at-the-edge-of-space

Here are some samples from previous flights:

Our next flight will be Away 131. We are calling this mission Thrive! We don’t want to just get by during these times. We want to climb, excel and thrive! Lift off is on May 2, 2021.

This will be a high altitude balloon flight running to 100,000 feet. This mission will be loaded.

Away 131 will carry PongSats, MiniCubes, CubeSats, Edge of Space Ads and high altitude airship hardware tests.

Are you looking to fly? There are 9 MiniCube spaces left.    For info: http://www.jpaerospace.com/minicube/index.html

Need a dramatic ad image for your business? Check out our Edge of Space Ads:  https://dark-sky-market.myshopify.com/collections/image-at-the-edge-of-space

Do you have a CubeSat just stilling on a shelf? Email me at jpowell@jpaerospace.com and let’s get it in the air!

Want to join in with the official Away 131 flight shirt?  Check it out at the Dark Sky Market! https://dark-sky-market.myshopify.com/collections/frontpage/products/away-130-mission-shirt

So get your mask on, social distance and leap with us to the edge of space.

JP

Don’t just test in the environment, develop there. That way every system, every part and the person that created them has a flight history.

Pics are of some of our valve work.

From the press release:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Rancho Cordova, CA  August 4, 2020  -  An organization in California is planning to fly a million ping pong balls to the edge of space. Over 18,000 have already flown.

All the world’s space programs combined have not flown as many student experiments as a little know California aerospace company, JP Aerospace. Now after 18 years the program called the PongSat Flight Program has become its own nonprofit, setting its sights on flying a million student projects to the edge of space, all inside ping pong balls.

What is a PongSat?

A PongSat is an experiment that fits inside of a ping pong ball. These ping pong ball ‘satellites’ are carried to the edge of space by high altitude balloon. There the PongSats experience the space environment: cosmic rays, vacuum, extreme cold and even zero gravity on the descent.

The PongSats stay with the balloon platform. After landing they are returned to the student. Students get excited about science and engineering by actually doing it. “We have 7^th graders with more mission experience than adult researchers in the field.” Says John Powell, President of the PongSat Flight Program.

PongSat is a completely free program, open to anyone.

PongSats gives students the chance to thrive during Covid. With science classrooms closed PongSat is more important than ever. We have been able to conduct safe flights with a minimum team all masked up and social distancing. PongSats made at home can be the inspiration to keep science education alive and to even thrive.

PongSats can be as simple or as complex as the student wants. Whether carrying a marshmallow to see if it puffs up in the vacuum of near space or an entire sophisticated satellite in miniature, PongSats creates motivation, drive and passion in their creators. There are endless possibilities for experiments that can fit inside a ping pong ball. PongSat carry seeds to see if exposure to cosmic rays effect their growth (it does!). They have also carried cameras, sensors,  GPS’s and even LEGO mini-figures.

Over 80,000 students have participated in PongSat flying over 18,000 unique experiments.

For more information:  https://www.pongsat.org

JP Aerospace, a volunteer based space program, created the PongSat program in 2002. It started out with 14 students. Excitement about the program exploded. Every month requests for tens of thousands of requests to fly are received. With new PongSat nonprofit organization we will fly them all.

PongSat as its own nonprofit entity has a stronger foundation. It means we can fly more PongSats , outreach to more students and continue to hurl humanity toward space one ping pong ball at a time.

“I’m convinced that the first person to walk on Mars is out there and they have flown a PongSat.”  John Powell, President, The PongSat flight Program.

PongSat Flight Program is a California 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation.

The pneumatic valve experiment aboard Away 130. This is on going development for the new helium valve for the Ascender high altitude airship. It’s test flight 2 for the system.

The whole mix of other things on the deck are what paid for it all.

Away 130 heading to the edge of space. Drones eye view.

The team is back home. Now it’s just unpacking, sorting and putting equipment away. We have about 80GB of flight and ground images to go through. Here’s just a couple of quick grabs.