SCHOOL space explorers are appealing for help to find a satellite which crashed to the ground in Tilehurst at the weekend.

Pupils from Queen Mary's Grammar School at Walsall in the West Midlands have been designing and building a balloon-borne satellite for a project named Horizon for a year but its first test flight last Saturday ended abruptly with them losing a signal in the Little Basing area in Hampshire.

The smartphone tracker on board failed and the youngsters were forced to travel home to Walsall without the satellite.

Teacher Adam Coghlan said tonight: "Since then we have managed, with help of Everything Everywhere, the network of the smartphone installed in the payload, to get a rough location. The mobile phone mast it was connected to was close to Little Heath Road in Tilehurst on Tuesday.

"We don't know how it got there but shortly after the phone company had been in touch we got a single location back from our smartphone which confirmed that it was near Little Heath Road. Our contact details were on Horizon but no-one has called to say they've found it."

Mr Coghlan added: "This project represents nearly a year of work for us and contains photos taken of the Earth from an altitude of 34km - that's 23km above the breathable atmosphere, showing the blackness of space and the hazy blue band of breathable atmosphere which surrounds the planet.

"The police are aware that the project is in the area and will be able to return it to us if it is handed in."

The satellite - thought to be in an area near The Birchwoods and Warborough Avenue - consists of is a 1ft cubed polystyrene box sealed with blue and silver gaffer tape and attached to a 4ft diameter luminous green and orange parachute.

Have you found the satellite? Hand it into the police or contact The Chronicle at 0119 955 3309 or news@readingchronicle.co.uk