
New GPS game is out of this world: Stratocaching - honzzz
http://technet.idnes.cz/stratocaching-geocaching-from-space-experiment-prague-czech-republic-1kk-/tec_vesmir.aspx?c=A131115_171153_tec_vesmir_pka
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hngiszmo
Oh my god how do 90% of the replies blow this so out of proportion???

Yeah, it is some 5kg of "litter" if you want to call it that. How much litter
is thrown onto train tracks on a normal train station in one day? Will
enthusiast jump after it to return it to some organisation?

Yeah, the paths of these "seeds" might cross some air plane or some person on
the ground but it is highly highly unlikely. Ever wondered why nobody is hit
by rocket parts on new year's eve? It happens but rarely enough because human
heads cover such a low percentage of earth that it just doesn't matter even
with billions of private rockets shot every year.

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Zenst
Indeed rockets landing on people do happen, happened too me, though at the
stage the fall most of the time (like nearly all) have already burned out and
just a stick that hits you on the shoulder and you think a bird has shat upon
you it is just so low impact. Least the one that bounced of me. But your spot
on the odd's are low and even then the chances of it causing damage are low.
It is the ones that go off incorrectly at angles into the crowd that people
worry about and with that one bad rocket at a public display - it happens.
Still if these seeds when deployed clump up, gain moisture and freeze together
into a large ball of ice and seeds - then it could be most epic a landing.

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pavelczech
The Dropion is retrieved and so is the first stratoseed. We are guessing that
the fierce temperature was not taking it easy on the GPS trackers. But it
seems that other seeds might have survived it as well. I'll keep you posted.
Pavel Kasik, Technet.cz

~~~
pavelczech
So far, two stratofeeds have been found. The others did probably not survive
the severely low temperature in the stratosphere. Those can still be found, of
course, but in the "hard mode", without the assistance of GPS location. At
least 200 people (more than 100 cars) are at the location of one of the two
retrieved stratoseeds.

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pavelczech
So far, four stratoseeds have been found, some of them by pure chance :-) We
are officially closing the game at 6pm (UTC+1), but people can obviously still
search for the stratocaches - there will be some prizes for late explorers as
well. We are now reviewing the video from the two GoPro HD cameras - I have to
say, it looks pretty spectacular. We hope to bring you the video on Monday.
You can ask me any questions in English through messages to our FB page
[https://www.facebook.com/TechnetCZ](https://www.facebook.com/TechnetCZ).

Thanks, HN! Pavel Kasik, Technet.cz

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shabble
For anyone wondering what's normally attached to a weather balloon, reading up
on the history of the Radiosonde[1] is pretty interesting.

Things like thermal insulation, choice of materials for
biocompatibility/minimal long-term hazard etc are all important parts of the
design.

There's a fairly in-depth tear-down and explanation of the bits of one by Mike
Harrison online[2]. The battery tech used there is particularly neat IMO.

[1] [http://radiosondemuseum.org/the-
collection/](http://radiosondemuseum.org/the-collection/)

[2] [http://youtu.be/xSxtwuTS5hw](http://youtu.be/xSxtwuTS5hw)

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maxander
How far do these seeds wind up distributed geographically? Tens of miles from
the launch point? Hundreds, thousands...?

~~~
cushychicken
I volunteered for a research group that did amateur balloon launches like this
in college. Our payloads were about 8 pounds and were regularly sent to 30k
meters/100k feet before a cutdown command was issued. I don't remember ever
measuring how far the package would get from the launch site when it reached
maximum altitude, but the package could pretty easily travel 100 miles from
its launch point to the touchdown location.

Here's the site if you want to learn more - they've got some neat flight data
posted if you're interested.

[http://spacegrant.montana.edu/borealis/](http://spacegrant.montana.edu/borealis/)

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xixixao
idnes.cz is the web presence of the "largest serious Czech newspaper", as they
like to call themselves. Proud to see this on top of HN. Geocaching is fairly
popular in the Czech Republic, though I don't know of a comparison to other
countries.

~~~
xixixao
The balloon is already back.

[http://technet.idnes.cz/starujeme-stratocashing-miri-do-
stra...](http://technet.idnes.cz/starujeme-stratocashing-miri-do-stratosfery-
fa1-/online.aspx?online=1005412)

~~~
yaddayadda
translate.google English version -
[http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&pre...](http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Ftechnet.idnes.cz%2Fstarujeme-
stratocashing-miri-do-stratosfery-fa1-%2Fonline.aspx%3Fonline%3D1005412)

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driverdan
This is a really cool idea. I can see it being a fun family outing trying to
find them and a good way to introduce kids to the tech involved. Anyone know
what the cost was for the project?

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ghostdiver
Isn't it dangerous for aircrafts? What if some turbo jet engine sucks such
seed inside?

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shocks
Engine engineers usually chuck frozen turkeys into the engine and they do just
fine…

~~~
honzzz
Here is an interesting video where you can see how they are testing jet
engines before they can be certified for flight - they chuck various stuff
inside including dead birds:
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jfXX7qppbc](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jfXX7qppbc)

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donretag
How does one actually play this "game"? The app is in Czech and the map does
not have anything displayed. Has everything been found?

~~~
pavelczech
The app was only one (a bit unreliable) way to play. Fortunately, there are
other ways. Most players just used the up-to-+date info from the website. or
they were lucky to find those malfunctioning stratocaches by chance, e.g. on
the field.

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aw3c2
Sounds more like Littercaching...

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pi-rat
"Breaking: Man decapitated by gigant space boomerang"

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codeflo
Don't get me wrong, the idea is cool, but I think there's enough plastic
garbage on earth already without dropping more from space. Who cleans those
things up if they land on private property?

~~~
lebek
More concerning: the pollution generated by the cars out finding these things.

~~~
testrun
Far more concerning: people exhaling carbon dioxide while reading about these
things.

