Dozens of participants from seven autonomous communities will launch their citizen science experiments this Saturday 27 April
The two large helium balloons will be launched from the town of Calamocha, in the Jiloca region
The Servet citizen science project reaches its tenth edition this Saturday, 27 April, with the launch of two large balloons from the Calamocha Fairground. The balloons will rise to the stratosphere, exceeding 30,000 metres in altitude.
This edition involves 16 schools from seven autonomous communities (Andalusia, Aragon, Asturias, the Canary Islands, Castile and León, Catalonia and La Rioja). Students from the 3rd year of ESO (lower secondary) to the 2nd year of Bachillerato (upper secondary) have designed and built the experiment capsules under the supervision of their teachers and with the support of the organisation throughout the school year.
Event open to the public from 9:30 in the morning
Anyone interested in learning about and watching this Saturday’s launches can come to the Calamocha Fairground (Av. América, s/n, 44200 Calamocha, Teruel), which will open its doors at 09:30. Visitors will be able to see the students’ work up close, as each school has designed a poster explaining its experiment, and watch the balloons being released.
- Place: Calamocha Fairground
- Opening time for the public: 9:30
- Scheduled launch time: from 10:00 to 11:00 (depending on weather conditions)
Their design has taken into account the extreme conditions they will face: winds of more than 200 km/h, -60ºC and a landing at about 6 m/s. Servet is a project carried out with the collaboration of the Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology – Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities.
The experiments are very varied: for example, detecting water resources in the launch area to fight fires, a capsule made of biodegradable materials that will contain a segment of mandarin, an experiment to test the effectiveness of medicines outside the Earth, or painting a picture in the stratosphere.
A tracking system will make it easier to locate the capsules after landing, and the organisation will recover them so that the collected data can be analysed. On Friday 26, at Etopia, Centre for Art and Technology in Zaragoza, the organisation will receive the capsules to weigh them and check that they can all be launched safely and without setbacks.
Servet is a citizen science project to democratise access to space, involving a whole community of enthusiasts of astronautics, space navigation and anything that moves above 12,000 metres above sea level. It is a project of the University of Zaragoza through the Aragon Engineering Research Institute (I3A) and the Ibercivis Foundation. It also has the support of eTopia, Centre for Art and Technology, the CESAR Laboratories at eTopia and the Spanish Radio Amateurs Union. The organisers thank Calamocha Town Council, the Government of Aragon and the Calamocha Fair Institution for providing the venue and helping to publicise the event.
Photos from the last edition: Servet VIII
The balloon loaded with dozens of capsules with citizen science experiments. Image: Jorge Lizar