Mack Benn student’s balloon winds up in bay

When a fisherman named Terry found a lunchbox attached to a weather balloon in the Chesapeake Bay Friday, his strange catch was a big deal to one North Suffolk fifth-grader.

Mack Benn Jr. Elementary School’s Tristan Jolley said Terry found his independent study project floating in the water about 1:30 p.m.

Terry called Tristan’s dad, Brian Jolley, exclaiming, “You wouldn’t believe this — I just found a lunchbox, and it told me to call this number!”

The story began when Tristan settled on the weather balloon concept for his year-end project, and his gifted resource teacher, Elizabeth Petry, gave her approval.

Tristan and his father bought the weather balloon online, filling it with helium purchased from Party City.

They assembled a payload consisting of a GoPro camera — designed for such things as attaching to motorcycle helmets — a Sony video camera, a snapshot of Tristan and sister Brianna, and a GPS unit. The lunchbox was used to tote it all.

Determining the best day to launch was the next step.

“We decided to do it Thursday, because there was not much wind and not much cloud cover,” Tristan said.

They found what looked to be a good site, where they believed the balloon wouldn’t be blown over the bay, out toward Franklin.

Brian Jolley tracked the balloon on his iPad, watching it drift closer and closer to exactly where they had aimed to avoid.

When the GPS signal cut out, they knew the weather balloon had reached an altitude of 60,000 feet.

“Obviously it went over 60,000 feet, because it lost signal,” Tristan said. “We lost sight of it, then we started driving around.”

Brian Jolley received Terry’s fortuitous phone call the next day. “My dad went to the beach (to collect the project from Terry) while I was at school,” Tristan said.

Tristan used the footage and pictures to make a video, which he has posted on YouTube, as well as a PowerPoint presentation.

He will present his findings at a Gifted Fair the school district is holding at King’s Fork Middle School next Monday.

Tristan said he learned you could dream big and make the dream a reality.

“My favorite part was the day of the launch and the day I found out it was found,” he said.

“My mom came up and watched (the launch), and we thought we had lost it.”

Petry said: “It’s this kind of thing that teaches students well; (students) say what they’re going to do and then follow through.”