Showing posts with label Worldview. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Worldview. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 24, 2019

not a weather balloon


So last week the Brewster County Sheriff's office posted some pictures of what they called a crashed weather balloon that they assisted in the recovery of north of Marathon.  When I saw the pictures, I knew right away it was not just a weather balloon.  Took me all of 5 minutes of Googling to figure out what it was...a Worldview Stratollite (similar to the Google Loon project).  I reached out to the company and their Media Relations Dept. responded the next day. The craft that performed a controlled landing (not a crash) was a Stratollite test mission designated Gryphon 13.  Launched from Arizona in November, it was a record flight for the company - maintaining navigational control in the stratosphere for 45 days...surpassing an October flight of 32 days.  Funny thing is, although it tipped over upon landing, Worldview posted a photo of it on their Facebook page with the craft standing upright.  Their current mission is Gryphon 16 which launched December 16th.  You can track that flight here.  58,73,56,0,B