DECATUR -- If you recall last week, a group of intrepid young scientists and engineers at Decatur middle schools were grappling with the principles of deceleration using the simple egg as a test subject.
Up next was the high school students' chance to test their designs during Egg Dropping 2, which was part of the Decatur summer school program at Peterson Gym in Decatur on June 23.
This time, the older students climbed the bleachers at Bulldog Stadium to use the side of the press box as their testbed. Instead of the 10-foot-high filming platform inside Peterson Gym the middle school used to launch nine different designs, the high school had a 30-foot drop for their experiment, including a much softer landing spot, the grass practice field below.
Climbing into position high on top of the bleachers was the first design built by Jasmine Herrera. Herrera's capsule consisted of two 16-ounce foam coffee cups stuffed with cotton balls to protect a pair of eggs. The exterior was covered with cotton balls as well. Her device was equipped with a pair of plastic shopping bags tied to each end of the capsule.
When Herrera released her device, the bags deployed fully and the eggs drifted slowly to earth landing in the soft grass. It took her five minutes to open the capsule and, to everyone's delight, the eggs survived unharmed, the first successful landing of the day.
Next up was Jesus Echeverria, whose design was similar to Herrera's, with the same successful results.
Tatiana Trejo tried her hand at a launch with a simple design. Her idea was to use fillers inside the twin foam cup capsule. Trejo's release was normal, but since she had no parachute or other device to slow the descent, the capsule hit the ground hard, resulting in the first failure in the event and two cups full of scrambled eggs.
Anne Xiong tried her design, which included a capsule similar to Herrera's and Echeverria's but differed in one major way. Xiong built up the outside with cotton balls that gave it a round look similar to balloons used by NASA to land the Opportunity and Spirit Mars rovers. These spacecraft bounced on the ground as the landing platform hit, like a rubber ball, until the landing platform containing the rovers stopped. The balloons deflated, and the two Mars rovers rolled off the platforms and into the history books.
Xiong dropped her device and, indeed, it hit the ground and bounced twice before stopping. Upon closer inspection, the contents inside revealed that she too had a pair of unbroken eggs for third success.
Norman Thompson was the final young designer to climb the drop platform. His design was the most elaborate of the five. Thompson's capsule contained more padding, but it was his deceleration design that was the most unique. Like Herrera and Echeverria, Thompson used a pair of shopping bags as parachutes with one added feature. He attached a pair of helium-filled balloons to the device. When he dropped his capsule, the device not only slowed to a gentle descent, but it flew the farthest of all five designs.
Thompson opened his foam capsule to find that he too had a pair of unbroken eggs, making for a total of four successes and one failure.
The success of this exercise, designed to show what happens to the body when faced with sudden deceleration forces, reflects the intellectual effort, as well as the dedication, each of these five young Decatur students put into this project. Perhaps these students will become the next generation of NASA scientists and aeronautical engineers ready to lead our country on a quest to the Moon, Mars and beyond.
Mike Eckels may be reached by email at [email protected].