Pico Balloon K9YO is asleep and flying at 12:00 UTC, Grid LN33JP, Akhayotar, Russia. Altitude is 12,900 meters, 42,312 feet heading east at 70 mph. K9YO went to sleep just west of the Caspian Sea and is heading east, past Japan over the North Pacific Ocean in about 4 days.

Weather is sometimes unpredictable, so we update our data every day.

One of the great things about our site is that we track our balloons movement using the NOAA (National Oceanic and Athmospheric Administration) Hysplit Trajectory model. Not only does NOAA provide information on weather, hurricanes and typhoons, they give us an opportunity to track our projected direction. By entering the altitude, longitude and lattitude of our balloons, NOAA shows us where we’re heading.

We use the QRZ Gridmapper program to provide the longitude and lattitude and receive the Grid and altitude from our Amateur Radio Station reporters. QRZ Gridmapper gives us the maps as shown below.

Our Locate and Track page has the links to all this information on both balloons.

Pico Balloon AA6DY woke at 18:32 UTC at Grid AJ74CE, just northwest of Kiribati in Oceania over the Central Pacific Ocean. Pico Balloon AA6DY is now flying 42 days and 5 hours at an altitude of 14,480 meters, 47,494 feet. The general direction is east in a wavy pattern, best seen on the Ventusky Jetstream on our Locate and Track page.

AA6DY has been over the Pacific Ocean since October 4th 2022. The NOAA Hysplit model for 48 hours is on our Locate and Track page, below is the 84 hour model which shows us heading towards South America.

K9YO in a faster Jetstream may be passing AA6DY around the world

Below is the projected wakeup of AA6DY on October 19th 2022.

Pico Balloon AA6DY is now getting regular reports of 1st and 2nd packets from stations in Australia and Hawaii and enoying now 42 days of flight.