Space Lab

Missions · Past

High-altitude balloon flights.

Before the satellites came the balloons. From 2019 onward, students under Dr. Rangelov designed, built, and recovered a series of high-altitude weather balloon missions — the practical foundation of the lab’s satellite work today.

Helios I mission patch — circular emblem with sun motif, designed by Echo Owen.

Helios-I

High-altitude balloon · reached 88,000 ft

Helios-I was a high-altitude weather balloon mission led by Echo Owen that climbed to roughly 88,000 feet before recovery. The flight delivered atmospheric data and refined the lab’s tracking, recovery, and post-flight workflows that subsequent missions inherited.

Group of Space Lab students standing in a field after recovering the Helios-I balloon payload, smiling and holding gear.

Helios-I capture party

Recovery · Texas hill country

The student-led search party that recovered the Helios-I payload after touchdown. Recovery work is half the mission — finding a balloon payload after a multi-mile drift is a logistical exercise in radio direction-finding, last-known-coordinates triangulation, and a lot of walking.

View from the Icarus I balloon at 80,000 feet, showing the curve of the Earth and the black of near-space above San Marcos, Texas.

Icarus I

First balloon flight · 80,000 ft above San Marcos, TX (2020)

Icarus I was the lab’s first high-altitude balloon flight, returning the now-iconic image of the curvature of the Earth from 80,000 feet. The mission predates the lab’s formal founding and was the proof-of-concept that made the rest of this program possible.