First Drop Test

We just got our parachute and were eager to discover that it actually deployed after being released from the second floor of Williams. We ran our test by first researching our parachute and ordering it to the school. Once it got here, we attached a 5 Newton weight to the bottom of it, and I, Benjamin Goldstein, went up to Williams’ second floor. The rest of our team headed outside to watch and videotape the drop. Once everyone was in place and the camera was recording, I opened the window and dropped the parachute + payload down to the ground / rest of our team. The parachute ended up deploying a little too late and we were unable to get a really secure estimate of how fast the payload would be traveling to the ground. We then ran the test with a 10 Newton weight and the parachute released even later. Our main objectives now are running a higher drop test tomorrow and figuring out a way to attach the parachute to the balloon and the box.

-Ben Goldstein, Mark Malburg, and Jason Smith