Mea Cook led a team of College employees and community members in a very successful weather balloon launch from the top of Morley Science Center on September 10th. The endeavor brought together College staff from multiple departments including Bronfman Science Center, Environmental Studies, Geosciences and Facilities, as well as community members from the Northern Berkshire Amateur Radio Club (NoBARC).
The balloon transmitted temperature, relative humidity and air pressure data continuously during its ascent to nearly 19,000 feet before contact was lost. The temperature up there? Four below zero Celsius, with 11% relative humidity and a pressure of 472 mBar! NoBARC members as far away as Pittsfield “listened in” on the data as well.
A special thanks goes out to the College’s Facilities staff for coordinating and supervising Morley roof access. In addition, NoBARC members Ed Grosso and Eric Mazur generously shared their time, equipment and expertise to help receive and record the weather data (sent via radio signal) from the balloon.
The bad news? September 10 launch was only a test – hopefully everything goes equally well when Mea repeats the experiment with her Climate Changes class on September 25!
