Weather Balloon Photography
Discussion
Weeeeell ......
.... an interesting flight and chase! The map errors were because of a stupid bug in my code. The ascent rate was lower than expected maybe because it was underfilled. It was quite difficult to tell how much lift it had with the very gusty wind. I was expecting to see a max altitude of 32km but it jet kept going, eventually floating at around 36km. It beat that marker and is now the 4th highest amateur balloon launch in the UK.
The coastal winds were very strong, and as it dropped it started heading out towards the sea. After a while radio contact stopped almost certainly because the antenna got broken off. One guy nearby did manage to receive some data though.
In the chase car we headed out to Aldeburgh which we thought was somewhere close to where it would land. With no radio contact I kept calling the backup GPS/SMS unit and eventually got some position messages back, all of which told me it was already at sea! We kept going anyway, so I could listen for radio contact at the beach with the yagi aerial. No signal at all. Shame, because if it was still floating and transmitting I'd have gone to try and hire a boat!
So that's the last of that particular payload. I'll post more when I get home.
Dave
.... an interesting flight and chase! The map errors were because of a stupid bug in my code. The ascent rate was lower than expected maybe because it was underfilled. It was quite difficult to tell how much lift it had with the very gusty wind. I was expecting to see a max altitude of 32km but it jet kept going, eventually floating at around 36km. It beat that marker and is now the 4th highest amateur balloon launch in the UK.
The coastal winds were very strong, and as it dropped it started heading out towards the sea. After a while radio contact stopped almost certainly because the antenna got broken off. One guy nearby did manage to receive some data though.
In the chase car we headed out to Aldeburgh which we thought was somewhere close to where it would land. With no radio contact I kept calling the backup GPS/SMS unit and eventually got some position messages back, all of which told me it was already at sea! We kept going anyway, so I could listen for radio contact at the beach with the yagi aerial. No signal at all. Shame, because if it was still floating and transmitting I'd have gone to try and hire a boat!
So that's the last of that particular payload. I'll post more when I get home.
Dave
Gutted for you Dave. This is something I've wanted to do for several years and will definitely do at some point, so I've throughly enjoyed this brilliant thread... Right up until you lost it 
To be fair, you can never be more than 51 miles from the coast in the UK, iirc, so that risk will always be there when launching from the UK mainland.
What was the value of the loss, and were any bears involved?
To be fair, you can never be more than 51 miles from the coast in the UK, iirc, so that risk will always be there when launching from the UK mainland.
What was the value of the loss, and were any bears involved?
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