Sunny St. John's Festival Sunday: Students inspire with weather balloon!

Sunny St. John's Festival Sunday: Students inspire with weather balloon!

Witzenhausen, Deutschland - this day, July 1, 2025, the Johannisfest in Witzenhausen transformed the city into a happy cooperation. In bright sunshine and high summer temperatures, numerous visitors, including students, teachers and various chapels, were found to celebrate the festival. The good mood was noticeable everywhere and the event attracted many people who wanted to enjoy the day together. Photographers such as Julia Dilling-Neitzel, Ulrike Käbberich and Tobias Stück recorded the best moments of the Johannisfest, so that the memories of this beautiful day remain alive.

A special highlight for the students of the Johannisberg School was the participation in an exciting technical project: a weather balloon that was designed as part of the junior engineer Akademie (Jia) took off on Friday at the schoolyard of vocational schools in Witzenhausen. Laszlo Böhmer (16 years) and Julius Heinzl (15 years) were the creative minds behind this exciting project. After around six months of hard work and planning under the guidance of Markus Meister, the balloon filled with 5400 liters of helium was finally sent up.

A look at the stratosphere

The weather balloon started precisely at 1:15 p.m. at a speed of about eight meters per second and had set itself an ambitious goal: a height of around 36,000 meters. After an ascent that lasted around 70 minutes, the balloon burst in the air and reached a maximum diameter of impressive twelve meters. The landing took place near Leipzig, where the coordinates were transmitted by short message. On its trip, the balloon collected valuable data about temperature, air pressure, light and humidity, which are now to be evaluated.

The aim of the project is to raise awareness of climate change and global warming. The students compare the collected data with archival values ​​from the German Weather Service from the past 30 years to make changes visible. This exciting initiative is not only a wonderful example of practical learning, but also for the commitment of young people for a better environment.

Innovative MINT projects for the school

The weather balloon project could also be inspiration for other schools. The concept of "Stratofolds" offers teachers the opportunity to take a research trip into the stratosphere with their classes. Weather balloons are used here to carry out experiments and measuring devices at heights of up to 40,000 meters. This method links theory and practice in an exceptional way that fascinates and motivates the students.

These initiatives show how important it is to interest children and adolescents in natural sciences. The combination of practical experiments and experienced MINT content enables students to achieve tangible results. Information on the programs and training for teachers is always available on the Stratoflights platform, where there are also extensive support for implementation.

Overall, the Johannisfest in Witzenhausen shows that community and creative minds can do a lot. With such events and projects we not only come together, we also learn to better understand and actively shape the world all around.

For further details and the latest developments related to the projects, you can (https://www.hna.de/lokales/witzenhausen/eschwege-ort28660/besserem-wetter-johannisfest-sonntag-beste-aCH-93808250.html) Johannisberg-Schule as well Stratoflights.