Seems like everyone these days is interested in writing something about High Altitude Balloons. With the increased interest in High Altitude Balloons due to the now in-famous High Altitude Balloons from PRC (People’s Republic of China) entering US airspace, the eventual shooting down of the balloon and spotting of other High Altitude Balloons tempers have been flying and the super powers have been trading accusations left, right and centre. Caught in this crossfire was a harmless High Altitude Balloon (called Pico Balloons) launched by some Amateur Radio enthusiasts from USA which was eventually shot down by the US Air Force, read more about it here – <Hobby Club’s Missing Balloon Shot Down by US Air Force>.
Thanks to Andrew VK3BQ, i was able to reach out to Donna Lu (science writer for the Guardian) and talk to her about the work we are doing with High Altitude Balloons here in Melbourne, Australia. Donna’s article for the Guardian is aptly called, “Inside the world of Australia’s high-altitude balloonists and why they’re not afraid of a missile“. You can read the entire article here in PDF form – <Link to Guardian Article> or a link to the original article at the Guardian website – <HTML Version at Guardian’s Website>..
Be part of an exciting journey : Everyone is invited to join the EMDRC High Altitude Balloon group and participate in our next High Altitude Balloon Launch. There’s a lot of interesting design, build, test activities to be performed before the launch. If you have the interest, keen to pick up skills in electronics, designing / testing / debugging, high altitude balloon launch and recovery, keen to learn more about Software Defined Radios, or gain hands on experience setting up and launching custom Raspberry Pi payloads into the stratosphere then join us on discord and drop us a line.
You also have an amazing opportunity so help shape the next generation High Altitude Balloon payload, test the payload to get it ready for the next launch, be part of the launch team helping launch the balloon and finally join everyone for the chase, payload recovery soon after. However, If you would rather stay home or rather grab a coffee and track the payload remotely then that’s great too. Here’s links to the software you need to track the High Altitude Balloon and payload we are launching.
- Project HORUS Chasemapper – Plot your position on a map relative to the balloon using a Raspberry Pi and GPS
- Project Horus horusdemodlib – Plot a reprogrammed radiosonde used as a payload for Amateur High Altitude Balloons
- Project HORUS Horusgui – Windows software to track a reprogrammed radiosonde used as a payload for Amateur High Altitude Balloons
- All of the images are broadcasted in real-time from the balloon (over WENET) – https://ssdv.habhub.org/
- Link to track the Horus payload in real time – Sondehub
Read more about High Altitude Ballooning and get started with your own High Altitude Balloon journey at https://hack2.live/high-altitude-ballooning/. Drop us a note at trevor at hack2 dot live if you have any questions, suggestions or comments.
