JP Aerospace

JP Aerospace is an American company that aims to achieve affordable access to space. Their main activities include high-atmospheric lighter-than-air flights carrying cameras or miniature experiments called pongsats and minicubes. They are also engaged in an Airship to Orbit project.

JP Aerospace was founded by John Marchel Powell, familiarly known as "JP", with Michael Stucky and Scott Mayo. JP Aerospace specializes in lighter-than-air flight, with the stated aim of achieving cheap access to space.

An early suborbital space launch attempt using a rockoon (balloon-launched high power rocket) at the Black Rock Desert in northwestern Nevada in May 1999 was unsuccessful. The event was covered by CNN. The CATS Prize expired without being awarded in November 2000.

In the early 21st century they developed a V-shaped high-altitude airship under a U.S. Air Force initiative to provide the rapid launch of battlefield communication and monitoring systems.

Since then, JP Aerospace has launched several balloons into the upper atmosphere, carrying mixed payloads for research students and media companies. Media clients have included The Discovery Channel, National Geographic, and Toshiba's 2009 television commercial Space Chair.

In 2011, a twin-balloon utility airship is claimed to have set an altitude record of 95,085 feet (ca. 28,982 m) on October 22, 2011.

A PongSat is a small experiment housed in a table tennis or ping-pong ball. A MiniCube is slightly larger. JP Aerospace claim to have carried many hundreds or thousands of student PongSat projects to a near-space environment at low cost. The flights are typically crowdfunded.

Flights, typically carrying cameras, have been made for a number of media organizations.

JP Aerospace obtained a contract for development of military communication and surveillance airships designed to hover over battlefields at altitudes too high for conventional anti-aircraft systems. A prototype was completed in 2005 but was damaged while being prepared for flight and the contract was ended.

Other vehicles are still under development, and JP aerospace has subsequently flown several aerostats as testbeds for ATO hardware and techniques.

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