Be on the lookout for Project Loon balloons!
It appears the weather is North America is good enough now that Project Loon balloons are floating over the continent after having mostly floated over South America when it was winter here in the states.
HBAL245 is currently showing up on my Piaware 3.5.0 over central New Mexico and HBAL043 is floating as I type this over west Texas.
Actuellement à l’Est de l’Afrique (Seychelles).
Two Project Loon visitors brushing past southwestern South Dakota/northwestern Nebraska this morning HBAL284 and HBAL285 on a lazy trek eastward…
HBAL271 located 34.756N -79.363W headed 290Deg at 6 knots
Near border of North and South Carolina.
Headed offshore now, ESE heading but frontal boundary leads NE. Just a guess but perhaps the UK and France, Portugal/ Spain operators should look for it in a week or more ?
I don’t know what the winds aloft will do- I’m assuming that it will turn NE but the operators may alter is altitude to keep it on a SE track towards N . Africa.
Maybe more experienced trackers will chime in here…right now its hitting 40 Knots @ 114 Degrees !
Anyone in Bermuda pick this up ?
HBAL0175 seen wandering WEST at a lazy 8 kts over central South Dakota at a high altitude of 86300 feet, launched from Sioux Falls SD. Interesting that a Skyview first shows a balloon icon then switches to a small airplane.
There was a writeup of yesterday’s launch of HBAL0175 at Sioux Falls Argus Leader June 28, 2018
The baloon is currently 34 miles south-east of my station and has ‘sped up’ to 16kts heading 271 deg. at 82900 feet. Interesting to see that although my feeders have nearly 290000 messages, only a couple (!) have actually shown up in the track log.
And I have a visual on the balloon itself high in the southern sky. Cell phone camera doesn’t cut it for getting a picture, I miss my old Minolta film camera with telephoto lens. Surprisingly easy to pick it out in the clear blue sky.
HBAL271 spotted at 57,000 feet over Northern California, near Redding:
HBAL0178 over Custer County SD (launched yesterday around Sioux Falls SD) - got visual sighting as well - shiny orb high in the sky. Weird standing on the ground getting blown by high winds west->east, while that balloon is sauntering to the west at a leisurely pace. Altitudes are all different from my three feeders, so I kind of ignore that value. Sure wish I could have saved the logged messages for viewing later in maps… a project for another time…
HBAL265 lat 43.201501 lon -103.841727 alt 54400 paid a visit 2018-08-14 1500MDT along with a buddy HBAL266 lat 42.852036 lon -104.286698 alt 57600
Too much smoke in the area for a visual this time.
It seems my neck of the woods is certainly ‘flyover country’ for Project Loon - there have been several balloons over the past week, two more wandering by early this morning: HBAL0194 and HBAL0195 - both MLAT source. I need to set up VRS or similar to keep track of these guys…
They tend fly in groups.
i thought loonies were Canadian?
Unbelievable, isn’t it? Talk about unfair ‘labeling’.
Endearment… 
Hay, we love the Canadians. More than half the crowd at the Sabers vs Leafs game the other was down from Toronto. There was no cursing, beer throwing, or fights but there was a lot of cheering at inappropriate times (like when the Leafs won). Heck I live 1 mile for the Niagara river and my mom was from Fredericton NB. I spent a lot of time watching the CBC and CHCH. But alas i don’t like Blue or Molson Canadian.
No slight was intended.
And none was ‘inflicted’. At least you did not call us Canuckstan.
Now, this hurts. Hamilton had its NHL proposal turned down, some suspect, to protect the Sabres.
More Loon Ballons! Launched somewhere in California earlier today. Anyone know where these are being launched? I spotted 3 Loon balloons on my piaware map earlier. It was awesome!
