The NCAA March Madness has evolved into a cultural event around the country, drawing millions of viewers to watch 65 college basketball teams battle to see who's the best.
Taking a page out of the NCAA's playbook, NASA this year posted its own version of March Madness. Dubbed Mission Madness, the online game pits 64 NASA missions against each other to see which will come out on top as being the favorite of space program followers.
Mission Madness began on March 19 and has whittled its way down to the final two missions, one of which originated right here in Palestine at the Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility.
The Superpressure Balloon, or SPB, is a pumpkin-shaped balloon designed to carry 1,000 pounds of scientific payload into orbit above the Earth for up to 100 days at a time.
Its challenger is SOHO, or Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, a spacecraft created to investigate the outer layer of the sun, make observations of solar wind and probe the interior of the sun.
Voting is online and open today and tomorrow, until midnight Tuesday. According to Danny Ball of the Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility, anyone with an Internet connection can go to www.nasa.gov, scroll down the page and click the link for Mission Madness. A "tournament" bracket will appear and you can cast your vote by clicking on either SPB or SOHO, then clicking "Submit Vote" and re-typing the code that appears (it keeps spammers from getting involved).
I just did. As of 1:20 p.m., SOHO holds a slim lead, 7,819 votes to 7,431 for SPB.
According to the website, you can vote as often as you'd like, kind of like the old adage, "Vote early, vote often," except that it's legal here.
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