Ballymena Today youth team member visits Space Camp 2014

David from the Ballymena Today youth team attended Space Camp this summer. We couldn’t wait to hear about it so we asked him to write us an article – here it is.

Space Camp 2014 came to the University of Ulster Jordanstown. It took place over 4 days. It is the first time Space Camp has been in Northern Ireland. There I made an app, learned about rovers, spacecraft that will be made in the future, a moon which may support life and more. I created my own blog called SpaceCamper22 where I explained what we did each day. It is for age groups of years 10-13 (the school year you are going into, because it is during the summer).

Space Camp is fun but educational. You do a lot of exciting things such as building rockets out of paper and cardboard. You don’t have to be super smart to go to the camp; all you need is a slight interest in space and computers and you’re good to go. I would really recommend it. If you want to find out more on what I did each day, please click here to visit my blog, SpaceCamper22.

Day 1

We learned about robotics and artificial intelligence. We also created rockets out of paper and cardboard. They went really high. We used software called Celestia which is similar to Google Earth. To learn more about Day 1 click here.

Day 2

We created a parachute for an egg which we threw off a balcony to see if the parachute would work. Did our parachute work? Click here to find out! We also learned about black holes and supernovas which are very interesting.

Day 3

We created an app using Appfurnace. If you click here you will find all about what Appfurnace can do and what the app I created did.

Day 4

They brought in a full size replica of the Beagle 2 rover. Beagle 2 was a rover that was lost going through Mars’ atmosphere. The Beagle 2 was supposed to look for evidence of life, past and present. There are only 5 of these models and they are very expensive so it was quite cool to see one and touch one. The model had everything the actual rover had. We also learned about spacecraft that does exist and will exist in the future. Interested in this day? Click here.

It was really good and I am looking forward to going back next year for Space Camp 2015. Hope to see you there.☺

Thanks to David for writing this article and sharing it with us here at Ballymena Today. Looking for more of our Youth Team articles? If so click here!