When the Balloon becomes a Cubesatellite

on the 8^th of October at 19:56 Middle European Time (MET) the research balloon BEXUS 19 was launched to its nightflight at the swedish space centre ESRANGE in Kiruna. Only a few days later another balloon, BEXUS 18 shall follow. On board of both balloon gondolas are fascinating student experiments from Germany, Sweden, Italy and Spain which are sent to the stratosphere. Two main subjects are covered by the experiments this year: One is two use the balloon as a satellite to prove data transmission systems and as a testbed for technologies which shall be used on future cubesat missions. The other subject is to carry and build new measurement devices for gathering more information about the earth atmosphere.