Thread View: sci.space
2 messages
2 total messages
Started by Peter Newman
Wed, 26 Jan 1994 12:23
Where to toy balloons go?
Author: Peter Newman
Date: Wed, 26 Jan 1994 12:23
Date: Wed, 26 Jan 1994 12:23
23 lines
1955 bytes
1955 bytes
Where do buoyant toy balloons end up? I was pondering this question after watching a balloon (in the shape of a parrot about 50cm long) ascend until it was out-of-sight at about cloud level. It seemed to me that the plastics that such toys are made from could probably hold a 1 atmosphere pressure inside, so there is no reason it wouldn't reach orbit! Or is there? And if they _do_ make orbit (or beyond), how long would they last? The idea of the Shuttle running into an orbiting parrot is kind of weird...:-) Pete Newman ___________________________________________________ p.newman@ucl.ac.uk Astronomy II, Physics & Astronomy Dept. University College, London WC1E 6BT, England voice: +44-71-387-4120 fax: +44-71-380-7145 wannabe: researching extragalactic distance scale ___________________________________________________ Happy is he who has been able to learn the causes of things -- Virgil
Re: Where to toy balloons go?
Author: Russell A. Hatfield
Date: Thu, 27 Jan 1994 07:15
Date: Thu, 27 Jan 1994 07:15
14 lines
1781 bytes
1781 bytes
In article <1994Jan26.122350.67750@ucl.ac.uk> zcapk43@ucl.ac.uk (Peter Newman) writes: >inside, so there is no reason it wouldn't reach orbit! > >Or is there? And if they _do_ make orbit (or beyond), how long would they >last? It would burst before it could even come close to orbit... the higher you go, the less pressure on the outside of the ballon, causing it to burst. Have you ever seen the expierement where they place a ballon into a glass container and remove all the air from the container? The ballon expands until it completly fills it. Same reason that the marshmellows expand on those stupid food vacume packing machine commercials :)
Thread Navigation
This is a paginated view of messages in the thread with full content displayed inline.
Messages are displayed in chronological order, with the original post highlighted in green.
Use pagination controls to navigate through all messages in large threads.
Back to All Threads