06x02 - New Mexico

[bunniefuu]

Dragonfly TV's floating up high in

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Major funding for Dragonfly TV is

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Amazon, number one You might know

something to tell someone

It's Dragonfly TV, Dragonfly

TV

Dragonfly TV. Dragonfly

TV.

I'm Eric, and it's another Dragonfly TV

adventure. We're riding the longest

aerial tram in the world at 35 degrees

north, 106 degrees West.

This place has the smallest amount of

water of any state. It also has the

highest capital, and there are blue

skies and warm sun almost every day of

the year. This state is famous for the

atom b*mb, Billy the Kid,

UFOs, and the Roadrunner. You

got it?We're in Albuquerque,

NM. A lot of different

cultures have lived in New Mexico, the

Pueblo, the Spanish, and the Mexican. And

their history is still everywhere, from

the Native American markets to the Adobe

style buildings.

Albuquerque is New Mexico's biggest city.

It's a hot spot for high tech fields like

aerospace. In fact, the father of modern

rockets, Robert Goddard, lived here.

Every year, Albuquerque hosts the world's

biggest hot air balloon Fiesta. Over



rise to the occasion. Alex and Andrew are

heading to the Explora Museum to find out

more about this awesome Fiesta.

We've got a date to experiment with

science. And in Albuquerque, there's only

one place to go.

Explora.

What's happening?Explore is a fun science

center where we can explore lots of

ideas. Looks like this is a camera that

makes everything go really up close. What

does your hair look like?Looks like a

million needles. Oh, my eyelashes look

nasty. But mostly, we just

have fun. Maybe I'm

crazy Maybe it's crazy

Wow, that flows pretty well.

Great, there you go. There you go. You

know what this reminds me of?What's that?

The balloon Fiesta. The world is hundreds

of balloons just flying up. You know,

I've always kind of wondered how the hot

air balloons stay in the air with just

the hot air and not the blowing air like

this. I think I saw an experiment table

where we can figure this out. Explora had

an experiment room that had all the

materials for us to try and make a hot

air balloon. Since we were working with a

very hot heat g*n, the museum had an

adult present to make sure everything was

safe. Here, how about we try the small

bag first?OK. All right,

there we go. Oh, it's inflating. Maybe

that could do it. Wow,

that's disappointing. Let's try the

bigger bag. The bigger bag?All right. A

little bit higher up. Let's see what it

does. I don't know what we're doing

wrong. Maybe we need a something

something bigger. There was some big

plastic laundry bags, so we tried flying

those. Whoa, look at that.

Whoa. Ooh, it's hot in there.

Oh, my gosh, it's floating. There it

goes. It's gonna hit the ceiling.

Wow, you know, it really took a lot of

hot air to make that balloon fly. That's

why those little bags didn't fly so well.

I wonder how much hot air it takes to

make a balloon fly. Since the plastic

bags tended to melt, we decided to make

our own balloon out of tissue paper.

This is awesome.

We got ourselves a balloon there, Alex.

We do. Way to go. Now we can find the

volume of our balloon.





You know what this is?This is an infrared

thermometer. We can use this to see how

hot the air gets inside the balloon. So

right now, the balloon is 71.6 degrees.

You're 82.8.



hold on. Almost to the ceiling. That's

amazing. We should go out and try to fly

it outside, see how high it goes.

Balloons fly early in the morning because

the temperature is nice and cool and the

wind is a lot more stable right after

sunrise. With dry weather year-round,

Albuquerque is a balloon pilot's

paradise. Chili Peppers aren't

just a band here. They're the number one

food. New Mexicans put them in just about

everything. And this is the ultimate

Southwestern treat, a tamale.

Better green. Both, please. Thank you.

That's the official state question of New

Mexico. Green chilies are picked fresh

from the vine. Leave them out for a while

and they'll turn red. Which is hotter?

Depends on the chili and also on the

amount of the chemical in them called

capsaicin. It's best to just ask

hot.

Actually, one of the hottest places in

the world is here in Albuquerque. There's

a special place here that can generate

heat equivalent to 1,500

suns. How does it get so hot?

That is our science secret, and you need

to figure it out. But now it's up, up,

and away in our hot air balloon. Alex and

Andrew are off to figure out if their

balloons really are going to fly.



go right now. There it goes.

Woo-hoo! Wow. Well, yeah, that flew

really well. But you know, real balloons

carry other things besides themselves.

Oh, just like the passengers and the

pilot. And the gondola that holds

everything, like the fuel source and

burners. We needed to build a model

basket, so it was back to the lab. Why

don't we use these pie dishes?All righty.

We're just going to have to see how much

it weighs so that we can know how much it

carries. Right. We also have to weigh the

balloon, too. Oh, yeah. The total mass of

our balloon, pie tin and string, was

about 26 grams. We're going to be using

pennies as our weight. About two and a

half. Let's go fly it. Sounds great.

Our small balloon had a volume of





Ow. The small balloon couldn't lift the

basket at all. Maybe we need a larger

volume. We built two larger

balloons. We doubled the panel size of

our small balloon and then doubled it

again for our biggest balloon. We weighed

both our new balloons and then went

outside to run some more tests.

Oh, my God. There we go. The medium

balloon had a volume of 150,000 cubic

centimeters and weighed 41 grams. It's

going higher. And higher. So it turns out

that the bigger the balloon, the higher

it goes. Oh, yeah. Oh, no.

Oh. Under the books will be reached.

Here. Let's add some

weight by putting some pennies in there.



There it goes. There, there we go. We

added pennies until the balloon could

just barely lift off the ground. We

figured this was the maximum weight our

balloon could lift. Well, I think

four's the limit. Me too. Based on the

fact that our small balloon couldn't

carry any pennies and that our medium

balloon could carry four pennies, we

tried to predict how much our big balloon

would carry. I estimate that it's

probably going to hold about 40 grams.

Right, 16 pennies. Our

largest balloon had a volume of



centimeters and weighed 83 grams.

All right, so if we take out a couple...

Our prediction was almost correct. Our

biggest balloon could lift 14 pennies.

That's 35 grams. Just for fun,

we decided to fly our biggest balloon one

more time with no pennies in it. Let's

go. Chase it. Come back here,

balloon. And how are we going to get it

down?I'll throw you up.

We are the balloon master. It was time to

take what we learned out to Balloon

Fiesta Park to fly in a real hot air

balloon.

Using the information we learned with our

models at Explorer, we wanted to predict

how much volume our real hot air balloon

needed to get us off the ground. First,

we asked our pilot how much everything

weighed in the gondola. How heavy is the

gondola?The gondola is about



the fuel, and the burner, and the basket.

And how big is the balloon?It weighs

about 350. Let's go do some calculations.

We knew our largest balloon, with a

volume of 436,000 cubic centimeters,

could lift a total mass of 111 grams.

We could use that data to estimate how

big a balloon would have to be to lift



After converting it from metric, we

estimated that we would need a balloon

that held at least 130,000 cubic

feet of hot air. All right, how'd your

calculations come out?What'd you come up

with?Well, we got the volume of the

envelope is about 130,000 cubic feet.

Well, you're close. It's 160,000 cubic

feet. Hey, is it all right if we

take some observations from a real

balloon?Well, I think that's a good idea.

Tell you what, if you guys give me a hand

here, we'll finish things up here and

we'll get it going.



What a view and what a ride. I've

always wanted to do that. Maybe way up

there, Alex and Andrew could see the

answer to our science secret. Have you

figured it out yet?The hottest spot in

Albuquerque isn't a dance club. A hint.

It's where some serious science takes

place, and Sandra works nearby.

Let's go. Hi there. I'm Sandra, and I

work with Renewable Energy. I work with

Sandia National Labs and Native American

tribes. Working with renewable energy and

alternative energy, it's so wide open and

it's cutting edge. I think that's

exciting. There's about



don't have electricity. That's a big

challenge for me to work on.

Lita owns this home and the power

line just stops right over the hill here.

She is independent of the electricity

grid and she has an alternative. We're

using technology to create her power.

What we're seeing here today is a unit.

That's actually creating electricity from

the sun. This is really where the

electricity is stored is in these

batteries and you'll see the wind turbine

in the background. So adding a wind

turbine makes it a hybrid. It's using two

different energy sources, not only solar

but small wind. During the day with the

sunshine, use the solar and at night when

the wind's blowing, you can use that

turbine. And I think what's unique about

it, this is the only power that Lita, who

lives here, is getting from anywhere. So

she has no. grid power, where you'd see

power poles in a line coming in. So we

work on multiple scales, so from a home

residence all the way to large power.

I'm from eastern part of Navajo Nation.

Growing up, I was thinking of how to

improve things, always trying to figure

out what the solutions might be. I was

always very good at math. Engineers,

scientists, we all have to use a lot of

math. To me, that was a key element of

science, and just always being

inquisitive or questioning, figuring out

things. When we

talk about being out here in the area

where my relatives live, I used to sit on

the rocks a lot and just think. It really

was a bonus to appreciate the

quiet, the serenity, being respectful of

the earth. Really keeping that in mind, I

think, really was instilled in me as I

grew up here. This is my tribe. This is

my land. I want to protect it.

Part of my job is to work cooperatively

with the Department of Energy and the

Navajo Nation. So I hear from the tribe

what they might need to get done, and

then I find out how we can get it

accomplished.

I really like being out here in in the

open, and I like being out in the

outdoors and and working with, you know,

things outside and working with people. A

lot had to do with thinking about how I

could help the community. If there's

something that needs to get an answer to

or give somebody an alternative, that's

what I'd like doing.

Sanders Laboratory is named after its

location. in the Sandia Mountains. Sandia

is Spanish for watermelon, which is the

color the mountains turn at sunset. You

can set up your own laboratory at home by

trying this.

Have fun with inertia. You'll need a

bottle, tape, a strip of stiff cardboard,

and a crayon. Create a hoop by taping the

two ends of the cardboard strip together.

Balance the hoop on top of the bottle.

Now,Bounce the crayon on top of the hoop

exactly over the mouth of the bottle.

Using a quick horizontal swipe, pull the

hoop off the bottle. The crayon falls

straight in. What happens if you pull the

hoop slowly or push it off the bottle?

Switch it up and let us know what

happened on our website. Hobie,

I'm just kicking back, catching some

DFTV. Did you know you can download all

your favorite segments to your iPod?For

free. Here's how.

Surf on over to the Dragonfly TV website

at pbskidsgo.org. Stream a

cool DFTV video. Play an awesome

game or try a surprising do it. And don't

forget to tell us what you're doing with

science. We want to hear from you.

We're

the Cleveland Middle School Energy Stars.

In Energy Club, we save energy and we

learn about energy.

We are the Cleveland Middle School Energy

Stars with some end of the day

announcements. If a 100-watt light bulb

is on for half a day every day for a

year, it would use enough electricity to

burn almost 400 pounds of coal.

An energy patrol is when a group of kids

go around to a classroom, seeing if

lights are turned off and computers are

turned off, and they get rewarded if they

have them off, and we just remind them if

they don't.

The best part about being as energy club

is doing different experiments. We did

separating hydrogen from oxygen, seeing

if it's combustible. We have a hydrogen

car.

Saving energy is important because this

world could be in a lot of trouble if we

don't stop using non-renewable youth

resources. It's our future, so we need to

learn about it.

Last year, the Energy Stars saved their

school nearly $30,000. That is

some smart thinking on their part. Here's

another place where you can learn some

smart stuff. The New Mexico Museum of

Natural History and Science. It's a must

stop that Isabel and Emily told me I had

to check out.

Hi, I'm Isabel. And I'm Emily. And we

love exploring caves.

There are a ton of really weird shapes

you can find in a cave.

We're at the huge caves in Carlsbad

Caverns National Park. These are way

cool. They've got these amazingly

beautiful features called steleophants.

These are called popcorn. And these are

lily pads. These are stalagmites.

These are stalactites. But we're not here

for just beauty photos. We're here to

catch some animals that livethese caves.

Flying animals, but not what you'd think.

Our

investigation started back in our

hometown of Albuquerque, at the New

Mexico Museum of Natural History and

Science.

The exhibits in the museum are like going

back in time. You can check out what

different animals were around during

different stages of New Mexico's history.

The Jurassic Super Giants are my favorite

dinos. Look at this one. The longest land

animal that ever lived, the Seismosaurus,

right here in New Mexico. Seismosaurus

means earthquake, blizzard. Because it

was so large when it walked, it probably

shook the earth. It's earthquake! Run for

your lives! Now we're in the Cretaceous

period. Unreal. Look at these dinosaur

tracks and the beasts. This is when New

Mexico was the seacoast for a giant

inland sea. And instead of the dry desert

like it is today, it was covered in

tropical forest. Look at all the

different dinosaurs and other animals

that lived here back then. After the

demise of the dinos, New Mexico became

home to many new and different animals,

including the descendants of dinosaurs,

birds. I love birds. Whoa, this

one's kind of scary. Yeah, and it's one

of the largest ever. Its name is

diatrima. I'm sure glad I didn't live in

New Mexico then. Now we're in the Ice

Age. Looks like things have changed

again. Yeah, now their animals like

mammoth and zebra tooth cats. Here's

another cool thing from the Ice Age, a

limestone cave. The museum has an awesome

simulated cave that's just like going

into a real one. Look at those big

stalactites. Yeah, look at those ribbons.

But what kind of animal would want to

live in a cave?Well, actually, some of

New Mexico's most famous mammals love it

in here. Bats. Let's go.



in Carlsbad Caverns and have called New

Mexico home for over 5000 years.

Then we met Michael, the museum's

naturalist. And he told us something

really cool. Something that you should

know is that there's a new species that's

showing up here in New Mexico. Really?And

that is the cave swallow. The museum

naturalist told us about a new animal to

New Mexico. It's a bird called the cave

swallow, and they just recently started

living in our caves.

The first pair of cave swallows appeared

in the Carlsbad Caverns only 40 years

ago. Their population has grown to nearly



New Mexico that's so cool. The

naturalists also told us of a program at

Carlsbad Caverns where students actually

study the birds in this colony. We

decided to take a road trip and learn

more about these newcomers to New Mexico.

That's how we ended up in Carlsbad. Just

can't wait to get on the bird again.

The life I love is making music for my

friends. And I can't wait to get on the

road again. So now you know how we got to

the caves. Before meeting the cave

swallows, we wanted to do some spelunking

on our own. Spelunking means exploring

caves. Carlsbad Caverns National Park has

over 100 limestone caves. These

caves are unique because sulfuric acid

has created these huge caverns from the

inside out. This cavern is

ginormous. It's called the Big Room. It

covers over 8 acres. It says here

it's the largest cave chamber in the

United States. We met up with the team

that studies the cave swallows inside the

big Cavern entrance. Steve, a local high

school science teacher, is the team

leader. Well, we're here to ban cave

swallows this evening, and before we do

that, I need to go over a few things as

to how we're actually going to do this.

We'll catch the birds in a large net and

take measurements of each bird we find.

One of the things that you'll learn real

quick is that a lot of the birds will.

Fly over the net. A lot of them will fly

under it. We placed a net across the

mouth of the cave entrance to harmlessly

capture the birds as they returned.

This is the way he flew in, so you sort

of take him out the same way, just in

reverse. OK, he's out. Once we

had a bird, we took measurements of its

wingspan and its weight. Steve told us

that a healthy cave swallow weighs around



in a plastic bag. This keeps them from

moving around and harming themselves.

When you're ready, just open your hands.

We're worried about the health of the

cage swallow. With only 1,000 here, we

were wondering how well they were doing.

The weight of the birds will tell us if

they're getting enough food. And if you

find a bird that's been banded before, we

can compare its older measurements with

today's. We'll be helping scientists by

adding our findings to the data collected

over the past 20 years. Cool, let's get

to it.



Yeah. One nine. Wait, two one.

About 41. Perfect. Get

him situated, and then we'll measure.



Hi, Kir. I like making it happy.

So we caught 49 birds last night. How

many of them were retraps?Uh, 14.

We divided the swallows we caught into

three groups. Hatchears, or birds that

were less than a year old, adults, and

retraps, which are birds that have been

trapped and banded in the past. We

calculated an average weight for the

adults and then the younger hatchears.

So the average weight for an adult is



is about the healthy weight we expected.

The hatch ears weigh a little less,



since they are smaller. Now let's look at

some of the re-chat birds. All right, how

about this one?We compared the weight of

one of the re-chat birds to its weight

the last time it was caught to see how it

had changed. In 2002, when he was first

banded, he weighed 25 grams. But when he

caught him last night, he only weighed 23

grams. But those are both around to the

healthy weight of 24, and his weight

probably fluctuated over the years. But

he seems like he's been pretty healthy.

Cave swallows fit nicely into the ecology

of the cave life here. And it looks like

the cave swallow's population is doing

pretty well today. But to be sure,

Steve and his team will keep counting the

birds every year.

You know, the museum doesn't have an

exhibit on cave swallows. We should help

them create one with all the cool stuff

we discovered. Yeah, awesome idea. Let's

head back and tell them everything we

found.

According to local legend, the Carlsbad

Caverns were discovered when a cowboy

followed a trail of smoke coming out of

the caverns. When he showed up, it turned

out it wasn't smoke at all. It was really

a trail of Mexican free-tailed

bats. One of the hottest spots

in the world is here. Let's see if the

people of Albuquerque know what it is.

Excuse me. Hi. Do you know what the

science secret is in Albuquerque?The what?

No. NoNo. One of the hottest

spots in the world is here in

Albuquerque. Where do you think that is?

Buena Fiesta. Mexico.

It's a bright kid. I don't know. In Old

Town. Right now it feels right here.

It's... Good job. Excuse me. Yes.

Did you know that Albuquerque has a

science secret?No, I don't. What's the

secret?Yeah, one of the hottest spots in

the world is in Albuquerque. Oh, wow.

That sounds exciting. No, I don't. Drum

roll, please. Yes, the solar

tower in Sandia National Laboratory. Oh,

wow. How do you think it gets so hot?Hey,

I don't. Tell me more. Well, here's your

answer.

Hi, my name is Cheryl. I'm a test

engineer out here at the Solar Tower at

Sandia National Laboratories. This

facility is used for materials testing.

We can get concentrations of



sun. The mirrors in

our field are called heliostats. We have



has 25 individual mirrors. Then we

can send the heliostats to an aim point

in order to reflect the sun's image back

to the target. NASA,

they're looking for temperatures of



samples that go on the outside of a

spacecraft, and it's supposed to be

burning off the front layer and keeping

the spacecraft behind it safe. So

bursting into flame is good for them.

We're in a very open area, so there's a

big variety of flying insects and they're

attracted to that light and they fly

right into it. So it's like a big bug

zapper.

What kind of science secrets are going on

in your city?Let us know so we can stop

by. Surf on over to the Dragonfly TV

website at pbskidsgo.org.

Tell us what you're exploring in science

museums where you live. We want to hear

from you. Want to watch Dragonfly TV

again?You can download videos of

everything you see on our show.

Coming up on Dragonfly TV GPS.

Pack your bags for next time on Dragonfly

TV GPS.

Well, I hitched a ride. This is awesome.

Balloonists use a GPS too, so we're all

set. Flip here next time to find out

where we're going to land.

Major funding for Dragonfly TV is

provided by the

National Science Foundation, supporting

education and research across all fields

of science and engineering. The

National Science Foundation, where

discoveries begin.

PBS has been inspiring new ideas and

creativity for generations of bright

young minds. Arby's proud sponsor of

Dragonfly TV and PBS.