It seems there is an ever growing trend in sending things to space that would otherwise not have a reason to go there. Googling “Things sent into space” returns more than a fair share of top 10 lists of this odd hobby from regular folk sending household items into the stratosphere to corporations following suit and strapping something with their logo in front of a GoPro camera and seeing just how high it can go.
This feat, whether for fun or advertisement, still results in something absolutely mesmerizing. The fact that with a little bit of money normal people can send things 3 times as high as commercial airplanes go and capture footage of it with relatively inexpensive equipment. Even if some of these videos are a complete attention grab for a product the resulting video is something so few on this planet get to see even in video form.
Popular UK brewery John Smith’s ran with the idea and sent up a 12 pack of their Extra Smooth.
The cans riding along a weather balloon launched from Sheffield reached a height of 37,430 meters where they then descended back to earth eventually landing 50 or so miles away in York.
So, did the beer take on any flavor-changing cosmic rays? Does drinking it grant super powers? Well, no. Since canned beer goes through pasteurization and remained sealed during blastoff, the beer itself was reported to taste pretty much the same. It might actually be a good thing that the beer didn’t take on the flavors of space when you consider people have figured out space mostly smells and likely tastes like burnt metal. However earlier this year there were reports of the center of our galaxy shows traces of ethylformate which gives raspberries their flavor so maybe it depends on where in space we send our booze.
What items would you send to space? If you say beer or bacon, I can save you a lot and money if you’d like to just send it directly to me.
HT: Munchies
Featured Image: DeviantArt:sottopk [Let’s see how many trolls point out it’s a Carlsburg Beer in the image but an article about John Smith’s]
