Lego Man in Space Thanks to Canadian Teens [VIDEO]
Two Canadian teens have put a Lego man in space using a home-stitched parachute and equipment found on Craigslist.
Asad Muhammad and Matthew Ho, both 17, attached the two-inch toy replete with Canada's maple-leaf flag to a helium balloon, which they then sent 80,000 feet into the air -- three times the height of a commercial jet's cruising altitude.
The pair managed to capture the Lego man's entire 97-minute journey to space, which began on a soccer pitch in Toronto.
Using a Web site that calculates a weather balloon's landing spot based on launch coordinates, prevailing winds, and balloon specs, the teens waited until the winds would be right so that the balloon would not fall across the border in the United States. They didn't want any trouble with U.S. Homeland Security.
The pair used four cameras set to take photos every 20 seconds to capture the toy astronaut's trip. The resulting video documents the Lego as it floats above the curvature of our planet before beginning a 32-minute descent back to earth.
In the footage, uploaded on YouTube Jan. 25, the red-shirted Legonaut spins around at an altitude three times that of Mount Everest before the balloon bursts.
Having attached a GPS receiver to the Styrofoam box carrying the cameras and now-famous Lego man, the teens were able to locate their toy when it landed 75 miles from the launch site near Rice Lake.
The teens uploaded two videos and 1,500 photos onto a computer when they got home and when they saw the images they screamed with joy, according to the Toronto Star.
The entire stunt was no ambitious homework assignment for the Agincourt Collegiate Institute 12th graders. The boys spent $400 and four months of free Saturdays to complete the task, reports the Star. They bought an $85 weather balloon, threw in $160 worth of helium from a party supply store, a dash of superglue, and voila, the journey began.
Ho decided to try his hand at astral toy tourism after watching a video where MIT students sent a camera to the edge of space for a mere $150. He enlisted Muhammad who wants to become an aircraft technician.
The boys have received mounds of praise in the two days since the video was uploaded on YouTube. University of Toronto professors commended the teenagers' resourcefulness, calling their achievement impressive.
Lego joined in on the fun, sending the boys a congratulatory note.
We are always amazed by the creative ways in which Lego fans use our products, and humbled by how many unsuspecting places we appear, like attached to a helium balloon in space, the company's brand relations director Michael McNally said.
Watch Lego Man in Space below:
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