We made it!   On September 8th we finally launched.  There was a small window where conditions were favorable for us to get off the ground.  We reached a maximum altitude of 96K feet (29 km), which was about 30K feet below target altitude.  However, we were in a near-space environment for at least 5 hours!  So your experiments were bombarded with radiation and suffered through extreme temperature and pressure changes!  The mission had to be terminated around midnight as the winds shifted which would cause the balloon to land in populated areas of Arizona.  But....we finally got off the ground!  

Here are some pictures in case you missed them on social media.  And I am still working on the video editing.  We have a "little" inconvenience called Hurricane Florence that i actually a monster of a hurricane headed to the East Coast.  We've been prepping for the storm this week.  Florence is a Category 4 hurricane that is going to cause devastation because of 12-15 feet (or more) storm surge to coastal areas where it lands.  Fortunately, we are now out of danger of the catastrophic effects of the storm.  But our area could still see 1-3 foot storm surge with torrential rains lasting for days.  And let's not forget wind.  Saturated ground + wind + trees = power outages.   So if you don't hear from us for a while...it's because we have no power.  Our prayers and thoughts for all our friends and loved ones along the North Carolina, South Carolina and Northern Georgia coast.  

But as promised - here are some pics!  We will not receive the experiments back to Virginia for several weeks.  Therefore, it will be October before we can send them back to you.