Beloved dog Oscar gets send off that's out of this world thanks to new Rugby business
A beloved pet dog who inspired a new business made his final journey by having his ashes launched into the edge of space from a field in Bilton.
Oscar’s ashes were lifted in a high altitude weather balloon last week, carrying a pet tracker and camera.
The balloon climbed to roughly 119,000 feet, well into the stratosphere and more than three times the cruising altitude of a passenger jet.
Oscar’s owner Jacob Battersby's is co-founder of Rugby start up Zoomi, a GPS pet tracking device designed and built in the town.
He said: “I lost Oscar at the start of the year, and Zoomi has been built around him ever since.
“When we started planning the launch, taking his ashes up there wasn't really a question - it was just how we were going to do it.”
The balloon burst at peak altitude, releasing the ashes into the upper atmosphere.
Onboard temperatures fell to around -72°C and stayed there for more than three hours. A parachute deployed and the payload began its descent.
The recovered tag – cold, taped and slightly scorched – is now back at Zoomi's workshop.
ZoomiTag replaces the old engraved tag with a full digital pet ID – accessible to anyone with a smartphone. It's a smart pet tag that stores your dog's medical records, emergency contacts, daily routine and more. ZoomiTag Health is an upgrade that becomes a GPS dog tracker and dog health monitor too.
The other co-founder is Callum King, a former pupil at Harris School in Rugby.
He was part of a science project that tried - and failed - to launch and recover a weather balloon. The payload was never found.
Callum said: “That stuck with me for years.
"We sent something up from Rugby, it never came home, and there was nothing we could do about it. Years later we're building a company whose whole point is that a dog should never just disappear.
"Going back, launching properly from Bilton, and getting the payload home with our own tracker, only felt right. It was a long overdue result.”
Callum said Zoomi works perfect on cats too.
"We're just finalising the slightly smaller casing for the cat model, but this'll be launching by the end of this month,” he went on.
"The dog version is now on sale, with the launch sale running until the end of May (this brings the sub cost down forever to half price).
"Every dog owner knows that gut-punch moment when your dog slips the lead or bolts out the gate. We built ZoomiTag because losing a dog shouldn't come down to luck, or whether a stranger knows what to do next.
"It's a smart tag that gives your dog a live voice - real-time GPS so you can see where they are, health monitoring so you can spot problems before they become emergencies, and an instant-scan recovery profile so anyone who finds them can reunite you in seconds.”
Find out more by emailing [email protected] or https://zoomitag.com/