NASA's Wanaka balloon

[Kiwithrottlejockey]

The latest scientific balloon launched from Wanaka Airport a week ago has been flying an interesting course, as shown HERE where it is currently flying a big circle in the vicinity of the Chatham Islands after first flying east over south-eastern Australia, then looping back across the Southern Ocean south of New Zealand.



• NASA 2016 New Zealand Operations — Wanka, New Zealand



from The Otago Daily Times....

• NASA balloon launched

Tuesday, 17 May 2016



from Fairfax NZ....

• NASA plans permanent base in Wanaka

1:59PM - Tuesday, 17 May 2016



from Fairfax NZ....

• Wanaka's NASA balloon flies into the west

3:08PM - Tuesday, 24 May 2016

[Kiwithrottlejockey]

Woohoo....the balloon has really taken off eastwards across the Pacific at a huge rate of knots towards South America over the past day.

Click on the link in the first post to view the realtime map.

[Kiwithrottlejockey]

WOW....the balloon has now completely circumnavigated the world and is just coming up abeam of Dunners (as I post this).

CLICK HERE to view the current location of the balloon as well as the track it has taken since it was launched on 17th May. If you click on the current location of the balloon on the map, it will display its current altitude in real time.

[Kiwithrottlejockey]

from the Otago Daily Times....

NASA balloon lands in Peru

Sunday, 03 July 2016

NASA's scientific balloon flight which eventually launched in Wanaka nearly two months ago has come to an end.

The super pressure balloon has landed in Peru, after 46 days and 20 hours in the air.

It's a record for a mid-latitude scientific balloon flight, and two weeks longer than the previous balloon launch from Wanaka.

Balloon Programme Office chief Debbie Fairbrother said Nasa was extremely pleased with the flight time and would take some of the lessons learned for its next launch.

• CLICK HERE to view the flight-path taken by the balloon throughout its flight.

http://www.odt.co.nz/news/queenstown-lakes/389029/nasa-balloon-lands-peru

[Kiwithrottlejockey]

Straight out of the horse's mouth (so to speak), on Radio NZ's Morning Report earlier this morning, Guyon Espiner talked to Jeremy Eggers from NASA's Balloon Program about the balloon and the reason they brought it down in Peru. I had noticed the altitude fluctuations mentioned during this interview and wondered if that was normal or was an aberration. You can listen to the discussion on Radio NZ this morning by clicking on the following link....

• NASA's super balloon, makes it to Peru

And you can view the flightpath taken by the balloon throughout its voyage by clicking HERE.