A couple of girls from Seattle made and launched their own spacecraft last month. Rebecca and Kimberly Yeung's handmade machine attracted many scientists, most notably NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab and the John Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory. And during the Geekwire Summit 2015, they got to meet an astronaut who had made it much farther than their own Loki Lego Launcher: Ed Lu.
Ed Lu served as a NASA astronaut for 12 years. Among his achievements is flying the Space Shuttle twice, the Russian Soyuz, and a 6 month tour in the International Space Station. He has a recorded spacewalk totaling 6 hours and 14 minutes, according to his personal website. When he met the two future scientists, he asked them about their spacecraft.
The Loki Lego Launcher comprised a weather balloon with helium, 2 GoPro cameras, flight computer to track flight, and a picture of their pet cat with a Lego R2-D2 figurine from which the craft gets its name. The Loki Lego Launcher was made out of wood and broken arrow shafts and rose to an impressive 78,000 feet. That is twice as high as most commercial planes normally travel, Geekwire reported.
Lu and the Yeungs had a nice chat in which the girls asked Lu about playing a keyboard in space. Apparently the answer is that you have to be strapped to the keyboard so as not to push it away while playing. Lu also quizzed the young scientists on sourcing out helium and the real possibilities of their craft landing on cow pies.
Lu also said, "I think it's important for kids to be learning about how science works, and learning how to ask questions and think critically." He adds, "And so it's great to see that in these girls." Lu's last advice was to parents whose kids are curious about science, "Kids, they do what you do." "If you show interest in something then they will too, Lu added."
See this adorable and awesome video showing the Yeungs building and launching their Loki Lego Launcher here:
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