Our Pico Balloon KD9WVO was launched on April 13th, 2024 from Willow Hill Golf Course in Northbrook Illinois. Our balloon circumnavigated the world 4 times in 65 days, flying at just over 43,000 feet, steadily traveling east. We are now on our 76th day of flight.
After completing the 4th circumnavigation, our balloon traveled up the Atlantic Ocean between Greenland and Iceland and started heading west over Greenland.
Reaching the 81st parallel north, over the Arctic Ocean around the Arctic Circle. The 81st parallel north also known as 81 degrees north latitude, is 621 nautical miles south of the North Pole.
Crossing the International Date Line and reaching just north of Russia, our balloon started to head back east crossing the International Date Line again on June 26th 2024.
Being so far north, our Pico Balloon has been in constant sunlight since June 20th 2024.
To receive our data, we rely on Amateur Radio Stations to report our signals on the WSPR Spot Database, KD9WVO on WSPR To understand how we calculate altitude from the WSPR data, other information on our project and regulations for Pico Balloons, please visit our Technical Page
From this data, we receive our location, altitude and any other data we may be transmitting such as temperature, humidity and pressure at altitude.
During our travels up north between Greenland and our current location, we’ve been relying on several stations reports.
The Research Vessel Polarstern amateur radio callsign DP0POL is now over the Arctic Ocean between Greenland and Iceland exploring the deep Arctic Ocean. Clicking on the highlighted link above, opens their app showing the world view in 3D, and the Blog of their current journey. Below is today’s post “Life under pressure”
For more information, please visit their website, https://www.awi.de/en/expedition/research-vessel-and-cutter/polarstern.html
We’d like to also recognize two of our newest followers of the NIBBB who have been able to track our recent travels, “Flo” KL7L from Wasilla, Alaska and Halldor, TF3HZ from Raykjavik, Iceland.
We hope that our other followers here at the NIBBB will see our current location and help us track our balloon.
We update our Locate and Track page daily for current location and 84 hour projected trajectory provided by NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA is one of our government agencies that provide the tools we rely on for scientific and research groups like ours to track and report our data.
Below is the NOAA Hyplit Model for June 28th 2024 thru July 2nd 2024, which we update daily.
We’re still in the process of testing two trackers before launch for our team members Kelsi Mulley, KE9LSI and Gordie Mulley KD9TVR
We’re expecting to receive our newest Pico Tracker in mid July for testing, with more information to follow.
Please visit our home page for updates to our project as well as the slideshow of Pico Balloon launch KD9WVO https://nibbb.org/
Thank you for following,
73, (Best Wishes) Cary KD9ITO