Note that this Challenge is covered as part of the program start Skype for your community’s Local Team of Mission 10 educators. These Skypes for the Mission 10 communities are being conducted by SSEP National Program Director Dr. Jeff Goldstein through Friday, February 26, 2016.
This blog post is for teachers in the 12 communities across the U.S. that just started SSEP Mission 10 to ISS. You are invited to use this Challenge with your students to get them thinking about the concept of microgravity (the technical name for the phenomenon of ‘weightlessness’). As part of this Challenge, students are asked to submit what they think is an answer in the ‘Leave a Reply’ section below. Please encourage your students to submit answers, so that all students visiting this blog post can see what other Mission 10 students across the U.S. are thinking. Let’s use this blog post as a social media platform for sharing thoughts about microgravity.
[2/23/16 1:00 pm ET update: WOW!! What great comments below already, and the post has only been up for 4 hours! Good thinking everyone:)]
The solution to the Challenge will be posted to this SSEP National Blog on Tuesday, March 1, 2016.
I’ve heard a lot about this weightlessness stuff, with astronauts having a great time floating around in space. So I wanted to find out first hand what’s going on up there. Since they don’t have a spare seat on the next flight to low Earth orbit (at least not yet), I looked far and wide to find an amazingly tall mountain whose peak rises to the Space Station’s altitude in orbit so I could climb up and see for myself.
Station orbits the Earth close to 260 miles (420 km) above sea level, and, by the way, crew and station are zipping along at 4.7 MILES PER SECOND (7.6 km/sec) relative to you sitting there at your computer. Bam. The Station just moved 4.7 miles. Really.
It took some Googling, but I found that really tall mountain! See my mountain in the picture? It accidentally got captured in an old Space Shuttle photo. Mt. Everest is only 5.5 miles (8.8 km) high. MY mountain (Jeff’s Peak) is 260 miles (420 km) high. I found it south of the Land of Make-Believe, down a not too well traveled path. Still, you’d think someone would have noticed it since it’s 47 times higher than Mt. Everest. (Have you ever heard of Jeff’s peak? No? See, nobody knows about it!)
So this week, I’m going to take the time to climb my mountain, and in my hand is my trusty bathroom scale, spring-loaded and guaranteed to be accurate at any altitude. I’ll camp out at the top, and I’ll wait until Space Station flies right by my mountain, so I can look in the windows and see if those lucky astronauts are weightless and floating around.
Here now the challenge—
As soon as I confirm they’re weightless in the Space Station, I’ll step on my bathroom scale to see my weight. If I weigh say 150 lbs when I’m standing on my scale in my bathroom at home, what will I weigh on top of my mountain? **
Hint: You don’t actually need to calculate my weight. I’ll do that in the Solution to the Challenge. Your assignment—if you decide to accept it—is to guess what you think I’ll weigh and why. Hmmmm, lots of possibilities.
Submit your guesses below in the ‘Leave a Reply’ section, and remember to include why you think your guess is correct. Students of ALL ages are welcome to post a guess.
I’ll even give you a week to noodle on this in class, and at home with your parents. I’ll post the answer next Tuesday, March 1, 2016, right here at the SSEP National Blog. See you then, and good luck noodling!
Also – if you want to follow along with the latest news from the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP), you are invited to subscribe to the SSEP National Blog at the bottom of the right column.
[**Metric system note: in the metric system, weight is measured in Newtons (N). 150 lbs is equivalent to 667 Newtons, which is the weight of a 68 kg mass at Earth’s surface.]
The solution to this Challenge was posted Tuesday, March 1, 2016.
The Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP) is a program of the National Center for Earth and Space Science Education (NCESSE) in the U.S., and the Arthur C. Clarke Institute for Space Education internationally. It is enabled through a strategic partnership with NanoRacks LLC, working with NASA under a Space Act Agreement as part of the utilization of the International Space Station as a National Laboratory. SSEP is the first pre-college STEM education program that is both a U.S. national initiative and implemented as an on-orbit commercial space venture.
The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (CASIS), and Subaru of America, Inc., are U.S. National Partners on the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program. Magellan Aerospace is a Canadian National Partner on the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program.
he will wiegh less
We will be half our weight
I think that if the mountain really existed that it would take him a couple of days for him to climb it. So when he got there, he might weigh like almost 15 pounds.
So he would weigh that much because of there being very little gravity.
I think that he will weigh a quarter of what he weighs on Earth because there is no gravity in space.
There’s actually gravity in space! If there wasn’t any gravity in space, the earth would fly of as fast as the speed of light.
I think that he will weigh about 100 lbs or less because the height and altitude.
I think he would almost weigh nothing because it’s in space were there is microgravity. Also, the gravitational pull isn’t very strong, so he would weigh a lot less.
I think that you will weigh less than half of what you weigh already. This is so because, in the ISS you are actually falling, not in zero gravity. So you will still weigh a small amount, but you will not be weightless.
I think his weight will decrease because the gravitational pull does not pull on the human body like it does down on earth.
i believe the higher Jeff goes the less wight he will have because of micro gravity.
I believe that he would be 75 pounds because that is half of his weight.
I think when you’re in space that you’ll only be 1/8 your true weight because of micro gravity
I believe his weight would decrease because the higher he will go, the less gravity there would be.
Very good responses! ☻♥
I think you will weigh from 5-15 lbs because there is such little gravity at that elevation. Because you are so high up in the air it will actually be like you are in microgravity
I think you would weigh only 10% of your body weight here on space in microgravity. The gravity forces pulling on objects in space are much smaller than on the Earth’s surface, so I believe that your weight would decrease in microgravity.
I think he will weigh 100 or so pounds less because of the altitude he may be defying gravity.
He will weigh the same as he did on Earth. Because he’s still on earth.
He’ll weigh nothing because of no gravity in space
I think the person would weigh 1.5 pounds
When he re-weighs himself on top of the mountain I think he would measure to be at a significantly decreased weight.
I think that person would weigh 150 lbs. because her weight remains the same, no matter where she stands.
1) There is no February 30th.
2) There will be no oxygen at the top of this peak, so the scale will show a greater weight including the oxygen tanks.
I think he’ll weigh nothing on the peak of the mountain because that part of the mountain is in space and in space there’s no gravity. But then again he’ll have to weigh something to not float away. So probably a few pounds lighter than he is, maybe half of 150 lbs.
My guess is that he’ll be around 50-80 pounds since the pressure of gravity is lighter in space and pressumably lightens you.
The Guess to Conquer All Guesses (Haha, just kidding) He wouldn’t weigh anything…? (Is he not also in space, looking through the window of the space station) so 0 lbs.
There is no February 30th, and he wouldn’t be able to breathe because he would pass the armstrong line – but I think he would weigh the same because he wouldn’t be outside the Earth’s atmosphere(?) (maybe)
75 lbs. <– divided by two cause there's less gravity in space.
He will not even be able to get on unless he strapped it to the floor.
You would weight the half you would weight in space.
example
say you weight 100 pounds in space you would way 50 pounds.
If I weighted 100 pounds in my house I would weight 50 on the mountin
He definitely won’t weigh as little as the people on the space station because he’s not in space so it’s not like there is NO gravity whatsoever, but I think he will weigh something between 50 and 75 pounds.
The higher you go the less weight you feel
I think he will weigh 250 pounds because how high he is
I think he will weigh around 90 pounds because there is less air pressure on him so he wont wiegh as much
I think he will weigh less because there is less air pressure pushing down on him. Probable about 50 lbs.
i think the scale would say 150 pounds because i gravity would still weigh you down!!!!!!!
I think he will weigh half of his weight. Because there is less air pressure on the mountain top.
I think your weight would be very light, but not weightless. Since there is microgravity, you still weight something. I would guess you weigh 1 to 25 pounds.
He would weigh less, a lot less, because he is in space. In space you feel weightless but maybe since, he’s not going to weigh as less as the space station people, maybe 100 lbs.
250 lbs because the mountain makes the person become heavier
i think he will weigh double because up in mountains there is pressure pressing down.
i think he will be heaver , because the higher you go more pressure will apply downwards against you , but you will still feel the pull of gravity pulling you down to earth and your still standing on a mountain and so it pushes you down making you feel crushed. You would be about 20 pounds heavier.
Luke-He would weigh the same because it would change gravity not his weght
He won’t be able to get on the scale unless he strapped the scale to his feet, but even if the mountain was real he would stay the same weight.
I think he will way around 80 pounds . Because the level of gravity would be lower.
I think that he will weigh nothing because if he is in the atmosphere then there is no gravity for you to even stand on a scale, but if he somehow does then he would probably still weigh 150 but it would look like he weighs nothing because of the gravity.
I think he will weight nothing because if the astronauts don’t weight anything then why shouldn’t he because theirs zero gravity and if theres zero gravity he cant even stand on a scale.
He will weigh the same because his weight doesn’t change, but their is less gravity the higher you go. The bathroom scale will be wrong because it is spring loaded and his weight will seem less on the scale.
If he is able to hike the mountain and stay on the ground while climbing the mountain, then he would also stay on the ground at the top , but if he didnt stay on the ground while climbing the mountain the n he would have to use a rope to stay at the same level as the international space station.
I Think……..
1. if he was over the atmosphere he would weigh about .1 pounds due to microgravity physics but die because he will not have any air!!!!!!
2. If he was under the atmosphere he would weigh about 270 pounds due to the atmosphere pulling on him but will die because of the pressure and low air!!!!!
I think he will be the same weight ,because the astronauts weighed their same weight