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Anybody can enter this contest: Be the first to document
taking a 1 metric tonne cargo up to at least 30km above
the equator, thereabouts, by balloon and returning
images of it to earth.
Contestants must supply the means to lift the cargo by
balloon (cargo straps will be provided by the contest)
to
the
location and provide the images of it within hours (not
more
than a day) after mission completion. Mission
completion is within a few hours after reaching the
desired
coordinates. Images are both HD pictures and HD video:
first, a steady shoot of HD pictures of the balloon. These
images are to be of good quality, of accurate color, at a
frame rate no less than one per hour [EDIT frame rate
down to minute], from each
perspective:
below-up, side-in and top-down, where the entire balloon
is
in the picture but taking up no more than 25% of the
frame.
Pictures are again of good quality, in focus (the
background
is in focus, as well) and clearly visible.
Second, two steady streams/recordings of HD video, one
shot down and the other shot out sideways from the
balloon, capturing the earth and the horizon, respectively.
Remuneration/Prizes for winners is the presenting of
several
T-shirts commemorating the contest and 100% of any
media
rights, advertising and etc, up to the first 100k USD, then
50% thereafter.
[link]
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Contest have a purpose if they stimulate new
thinking on a particular issue. This just asks you
to do more of what hundreds of people are doing
now, except the FAA and several other
organizations won't let you as it exceeds the
maximum weight limit allowed so force entrants to
fill out lots of paperwork. All this would do is
stimulate the mass production of large balloons. It
is also possible that this test has already been
completed by the US government as they send a
bunch of big things up over the poles like
telescopes. |
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A better contest would be a max altitude, max
distance, max duration or minimum weight with
recovery. |
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Maybe not, [Sir_Misspeller] has a certain ring to it. |
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[MisterQED], You are correct, I should have required all
the entrant-balloons be reusable, entirely avoiding
non-reusablness. As for the US governments' interest in
being the first applicant. Well, they need to handle
their own paper work and launch my cargo over the
equator... or no T-shirt! |
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[WcW], you are correct. I have a few in mind |
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So many [mfd]'s so little time. |
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echo of [MB]'s N-prize, except I assume that [SM] isn't actually organizing the contest. |
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baked in the many articles that describe using LTA craft to lift stuff. |
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redundant with another post that postulates using LTA craft for logging (where an individual tree trunk would weigh a tonne easily) |
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Ooh, I might be able to do this one.
Let's see, if force equals mass times accelleration, then 1 metric tonne of cargo falling 30km would be 30000 meters at 1 meter per second squared and the size of the crater it would make would be...
uh
No, nope I lost it. |
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It will have 294 MJ of potential energy, which corresponds to 62œ kg of TNT, if that helps. |
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Why does the contest supply only cargo straps? [-] |
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