WILMINGTON — Hundreds of weather balloons are sent into the sky twice a day around the world, including here in the Miami Valley.
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There are two critical pieces when launching a weather balloon: the balloon itself and a radiosonde.
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Christine Aiena, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Wilmington, walked Storm Center 7 meteorologist Nick Dunn through the process.
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“This is the antenna right here, this is the piece we will attach the flight train when we go back outside to launch the balloon. This here will measure the temperature as our sonde goes through the atmosphere. Under this is a little cap that will help us measure moisture to eventually will help us with the relative humidity,” Aiena said.
Before the balloon can be inflated, a series of safety checks must be completed.
The electronics can’t be brought inside the building because of the hydrogen.
“No camera, no watches, no phones, nothing,” Aiena said.
The latex balloon is laid out on the table and attached to the hydrogen nozzle to start inflating. This takes several minutes.
While the balloon is inflating, a flight train of string and a parachute is assembled to guide the radiosonde upward as the balloon is launched.
During the inflation, crews go back inside to make sure the GPS is working so data can start coming in after the launch.
“The lowest cloud observed as a 090, so that would be a nine. This is a mid-layer. I have my handy cloud book to help us identify my clouds. This is an altostratus. And we cannot see anything above that,” Aiena said. “Now my only job is to call the Wilmington Airpark to ensure no planes are incoming or exiting. We do not want to have any interaction with a plane and a weather balloon.”
The flight train of the string is attached to the balloon. Several knots are made to make sure there are no hydrogen leaks.
This is important to ensure the balloon flies through the atmosphere.
Next, the radiosonde is attached to the flight train so data can be received once the balloon is in the air.
Storm Center 7’s meteorologist Nick Dunn watched as Aiena brought the balloon outside and released it into the air.
Weather balloons pop near 100,000 feet.
The parachute and radiosonde land eventually but are no threat to humans.
This is data that the Storm Center 7 team relies on to analyze the atmosphere daily to deliver coverage you can count on.
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