Canadians Send Lego Man to Space

While Newt Gingrich may have people in America excited about a moon colony, two boys in Canada have the world intrigued by their own unique space launch. Mathew Ho and Asad Muhammad of Toronto thought it would be cool to send a Lego man to space. After $400 and a few months, they have a video that shows the small plastic figure floating 78,000 feet off the ground.

The 17-year-old boys posted the video on YouTube and it instantly started spreading all over the Internet. The video shows the Lego man reaching an altitude three times higher than the peak of Mount Everest. "We never knew it would be this good," said Ho. Several days after the Lego man had returned to Earth the boys were able to find him in a field. He had survived his hour and a half endeavour.

The video has over 1 million views and in one day Yahoo! saw a 325% increase in searches for "Lego man in space." The boys are handling all the attention well. Including comments from Dr. Michael Reid, a University of Toronto astrophysics professor, who said, "Noting that similar projects had been undertaken by PhD students; For two 17-year-olds to accomplish this on their own is pretty impressive."

Legos were first sold in the United States and Canada in the 1960s, well before either of these boys were born. In 1979, Lego created their first space series. Now, over thirty years later one of the Lego men actually got to travel to space. One day he might return to space to take a very small step for Lego enthusiasts everywhere. In the meantime, we will just have to enjoy watching the video on You Tube.

To watch the video click HERE.

Join the Conversation	You are following this conversation | stop following follow this conversation by email