GoPro On Rocket Captures Stunning Videos In Near-Space

UP Aerospace Inc launched a 20ft. SL-10 rocket into space last November, and it did so with a GoPro action camera strapped to the side. That video was recently showcased by GoPro, showing stunning views of "near-space" as it reached an altitude of about 396,000 feet. In it, we see incredible views of Earth, space, and the rocket itself as its blasts free of its first stage.

The rocket was launched as part of a mission to deploy the Maraia Capsule in order to test how stable and aerodynamic the payload's re-entry will be. The speeds reached up to Mach 5.5, which is 3,800MPH. It appears a few different GoPro HERO 4 cameras were used — you can see the process of flying upward, blasting into near-space, and then falling back to Earth.

The video journey is slow and graceful, and it ends with a bright red parachute deploying and the unit finally falling into a tree. This isn't the first time a GoPro has been sent high above Earth; this past September, a GoPro camera was found after missing for two years,and it included incredible images of Earth as seen from space.

In that case, a group sent the GoPro up with a weather balloon, but lost track of it when it reentered the planet. Despite efforts, they weren't able to find it at the time — it instead surfaced years later in good condition. It had been an AT&T worker who found the camera, which was a fitting end, as it had been an inaccurate AT&T map that caused the group to wrongly determine the camera's landing spot.

SOURCE: YouTube