BOREALIS - Montana Space Grant Consortium | Montana Space Grant Consortium

BOREALIS logo

Balloon Outreach, Research, Exploration and Landscape Imaging System

BOREALIS is MSGC's stratospheric ballooning program. In the program, students from a variety of majors work together to conceive, design and build payloads that are flown up to 100,000 feet - the edge of space. BOREALIS has two complete ballooning programs at Montana State University and the Salish Kootenai College. Other MSGC Affiliate campuses develop science and engineering payloads to fly in coordination with the two university programs.

Follow a flight live at: Balloon Flight Tracker

Getting involved!

MSU Open House:

Every Thursday

5:00 pm – 7:00 pm during the academic year

At the BOREALIS lab

All students are welcome to come to the BOREALIS lab during open house, regardless of major, year in school, or experience. Students can tour the lab, or even get involved working on a project.

Location

150 West Lincoln Street

Bozeman, MT 59718

Marsh Modular 2

45°39'52.2"N 111°03'54.7"W

BOREALIS Location

BOREALIS lab building

Internships and Apprenticeships:

Learn about how to apply for a BOREALIS internship or apprenticeship: research opportunities

Highlights

Nationwide Eclipse Ballooning Project (NEBP)

A project lead by the BOREALIS lab to stream live footage of the October 14, 2023 annular eclipses and the April 8, 2024 total solar eclipses. With 53 teams and over 750 participant from all over the nation taking part in this project.

NEBP Website

Night flight

On October 24th 2024 the first Night Flight in the BOREALIS labs history was launched. Equipt with a new beacon payload, the balloon was released at dusk.

Night Flight Article

Current Balloon System

2024 Payload System Diagram. The top is the balloon, with the vent and parachute attached below. Then there are harness cords that connect to the payloads below. A picture of a balloon with cords bellow attaching to payloads.