The MARSBalloon mission launched 55 student experiments designed to carry out real Mars science on Sunday 26 October. These experiments were designed and created by UK primary and secondary school students. This is the second flight of a unique project aimed to encourage young people to take up careers in the UK space industry. The project was devised and is run by young space engineers from Thales Alenia Space UK with funding from the Science & Technology Facilities Council (STFC).

The experiments were carried over 30 kilometres up into the Earth’s atmosphere on a high altitude balloon, named Elysium after a volcanic region of Mars, where they experienced temperatures as low as -50°C, pressures of 1% of that at sea level and increased levels of radiation; conditions which are very similar to that of the surface of Mars. These conditions can rapidly degrade materials, damage electronics and sterilise organics.

The students were set the challenge to come up with experiments for testing anything that humans might want to take or do on Mars in the future. All of the experiments had to fit inside a Kinder Surprisetm toy capsule and were mounted onto a special tray beneath the balloon to maximise their exposure to the hostile environment.

The mission was launched from a Thales UK testing site in the Mendips at 12:05pm. The balloon and experiments then rose to a maximum altitude of 31,240 metres at which the balloon burst and the experiments fell via parachute for a landing in Bramshill Forest, Eversley (112 kilometres from the launch site). The on-board tracking system then allowed the launch team to recover the tray and all of the experiments safely two hours later.

The idea for the mission was inspired by the need to show how fun and diverse careers in space engineering and science (and other STEM subjects) can be to meet the government’s goal of quadrupling the size of the UK Space industry by 2030. This means the industry is going to need 70,000 new space engineers, operators and scientists in the next 15 years to continue the vital work that space science and satellites do for our world. The project was also intended to allow UK students to carry out original Mars science, an opportunity that is not currently available to schools anywhere else in the world.

This launch follows a previous MARSBalloon mission, named Tharsis after another volcanic region of Mars, which successfully flew in June 2014 with 80 experiments from 30 schools.

UK secondary school teachers interested in entering their class or club onto flights planned for 2015 should register on the project website.

The experiments recovered from Elysium will be returned to the students who made them. They will be encouraged to write up their scientific results for publishing on the project website.

 

Notes to Editors:
1. The MARSBalloon project was devised and run by young space engineers from TAS UK. The project is free for schools to participate and is open to all secondary schools in the UK. The students are set the challenge to design experiments related to anything that humans might want to take or do on Mars in the future. These experiments were then launched on high altitude balloons into Earth’s stratosphere that recreated the conditions of low pressure, -50ºC temperatures and high cosmic radiation found on the surface of Mars.

2. Tharsis and Elysium are successors to last year’s MARSBalloon pilot program, funded by the UK Space Agency, which launched 140 primary, secondary and university student experiments on two balloons, named Phobos and Deimos after the moons of Mars.

3. Full details of the flight including video highlights, imagery, flight data and experiment results will be published on its dedicated page

4. For more information contact:

Mr Andrew Bacon
Senior Space Systems Engineer
Thales Alenia Space UK Ltd
andrew.bacon@thalesaleniaspace.com
+44 (0) 1179 375231

or

Mr Michael Guest
Senior Space Systems Engineer
Thales Alenia Space UK Ltd
Michael.guest@thalesaleniaspace.com
+44 (0) 1179 375316