DAEJEON, Oct. 18 (Korea Bizwire) – South Korea’s ‘Teen Astronauts’ succeeded in launching four space balloons, which are supposed to record the earth from the stratosphere. And a miniature Tayo bus, which looks like the characters of Korean popular 3D animation, “Tayo the Little Bus,” was on board the spaceship.
The young enthusiastic space explorers — a total of 30 teenage students — made the flying equipment for themselves and sent off the four “creatively invented spaceships” toward the stratosphere at the Space Science Park inside the Korea’s National Science Museum (NSM), announced the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) on October 16.
Space balloons, often called as high-altitude balloons, are unmanned balloons, usually filled with helium or hydrogen, that are released into the stratosphere, generally attaining between 60,000 to 120,000 feet. The spaceship launched by the pupils, soared up to the stratosphere, 30 kilometers above the ground, and they took pictures of the earth and the space and then fell free.
The spaceship contained meteorological balloon (weather balloon), parachute, cameras, and satellite navigation systems, such as GPS receivers.
A student named Jin Kyung-won (2nd grade in middle school) who joined the occasion this time, said, “The space travel was in fact in my vague dreaming, but it became real, and a passion to be an inventor rekindled indeed.”
Another young space explorer, Park Seul-bi (5th grade in primary school) also said, “I was surprised to see an invention made of materials in everyday life can make its way to the space, and I came to realize that invention is not necessarily confined to special people.”
The Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO), the organizer of the event, plans to collect the space balloon and post the recorded video on its official YouTube site with an aim to use the content in the related education fields.
“We planned this project to offer young people a chance to play their creativity and dream farther field to the space,” said Commissioner Kim Young-min of KIPO. “I hope this project encourages them to dream of creative inventors who are the key to the Korea’s creative economy.”
For the successful space adventure, a number of experts and organizations contributed their resources to the event. Kim Gi-soo, professor in Department of Technology Education at Chungnam National University, along with his current and former students. And the Unlimited Imagination Office of NSM and the Electronics Telecommunications Research Institute took on the production of miniature spacemen that boarded them.
By M.H. Lee (mhlee@koreabizwire.com)
Pingback: US, China Vow To Handle Rifts Forward Of Obama Go to | Ecircassia