A major system in NITESat is the imaging payload.  It's correct design and proper operation are critical to the success of the NITESat mission.  Consequently, we are building a prototype imaging system, called NITELITE.  This prototype will provide an engineering demonstration of the NITESat imaging system.  It will allow us to test as much of […]

We participated in a high-altitude balloon (HAB) launch recently.  This was a night launch and our goal was to capture images of night-time illumination on the ground.  We planned to test the low-light sensitivity of some off-the-shelf imaging systems to define a basic performance benchmark for the NITESat nanosatellite mission. We were testing a hacked […]

Last Sunday we participated with Far Horizons in a high altitude balloon launch.  We set up at our usual airfield, Koerner Aviation.  Launch time was set for 7:15pm, about half an hour before local sunset.  Our goal was to get some good video of the Earth limb and the terminator shadow moving across the ground. […]

After the difficulties we had with the MarsDrop parawing guided descent experiment earlier this spring, we conducted some low altitude testing to learn the best way to pack the parawing for deployment.  Following these drop tests, we managed to fly the parawing several times to successful recoveries. Most recently, we flew the MarsDrop payload in […]

MarsDrop is an initiative to develop an inexpensive space probe that will land on Mars using a parawing. The parawing will allow the probe to fly significant distances through the Martian atmosphere under controlled guidance. The only way this can be tested on Earth is to drop the probe and parawing from a high-altitude balloon […]