Little Debbie Once Sent This Snack Cake 18 Miles Into Space

As humans, we've always been fascinated by space. We can't help it. Unsatisfied with simply exploring our own little planet, we've spent years trying to figure out what's going on outside its perimeter. We've shot cameras up there, built a floating space station, and sent astronauts to step foot on the moon. Even Little Debbie has gotten in on the action, firing a chocolatey snack cake into the stratosphere back in 2014.

That's right, as out of this world as it sounds, a Cosmic Cupcake once floated 18 miles into space. The stunt was part of a genius publicity scheme by the iconic snack brand for what was a new product at the time. A mashup of Little Debbie's classic Chocolate Cupcake and Cosmic Brownie, the Cosmic Cupcake featured a decadent, creme-filled chocolate cupcake topped with a fudgy icing and sprinkled with rainbow chip candy. It's not in production anymore, but we hold firm that it's one of the nine discontinued Little Debbie snacks that need to make a comeback.

In order to promote the Cosmic Cupcake after its release, Little Debbie partnered with the University of Tennessee Chattanooga for a fun science experiment that involved tying a box of the treats to a weather balloon and letting it float into the atmosphere. The balloon made it 18 miles into the sky, technically leaving the earth's lowest atmospheric layer and inching towards outer space.

The experiment took place on March 19, 2014 at the UTC Challenger STEM Learning Center, where a box of Cosmic Cupcakes was attached to the balloon on a platform that also held a bobblehead appropriately named Commander Little Debbie. The platform also held a GPS tracking system and several Go Pro cameras so that the action could be followed in real time.

A local meteorologist and a group of children from a nearby school gathered that morning to count down the team as they sent off the balloon, which reached an altitude of 100,000 feet before drifting back down to earth. It took nearly three hours for the balloon (cupcakes and Commander Little Debbie, included) to reach the desired height, where the temperature was -55 degrees Fahrenheit. The goal was for the balloon to complete a 110-mile round trip, before landing in the Nantahala National Forest.

We don't know if the bobblehead and cupcakes were ever found but we do know that this actually wasn't Little Debbie's first foray into space. In 1991, astronauts on the space shuttle Atlantis enjoyed an array of Little Debbie snacks that were stored in the pantry for Thanksgiving. We can only hope they enjoyed some Oatmeal Cream Pies up there on our behalf.