ALAMOSA — The clear blue skies over the San Luis Valley looked a little different earlier this week when a large, white object was seen floating overhead. No, it wasn’t a spycraft from a foreign country. It wasn’t even a weather balloon. It was a Stratollite high-altitude balloon system owned and launched by World View Experience, a company based out of Arizona.
According to Phil Wocken, World View Experience vice president of marketing and communications, this particular Stratollite was launched out of Page, Ariz., on Sept. 15. It’s flying at a little more than 67,000 feet on a mission to test communication systems in the stratosphere. For context, 67,000 feet is almost twice as high as most commercial airplanes fly.
“The system that your readers saw [on September 30] flew south and was near the Santa Fe area on Tuesday,” Wocken said.
Stratollites are often confused with weather balloons, but the differences are pretty stark. Weather balloons are basic and, once launched, can drift into the stratosphere where, if they get too high, they pop.
In contrast, a Stratollite is described as a high-altitude balloon system that uses a combination of a zero-pressure lift balloon filled with helium and a super-pressure ballast balloon to lift a stratospheric vehicle with payloads attached into the stratosphere. (The stratosphere is the second lowest layer of Earth’s atmosphere.)
The two-balloon system, like the one seen over the Valley, is used to control altitude and to find directional winds and, while being navigated remotely, can either travel to a new area or hang out (literally) over a specific site. Missions using this type of Stratollite can last up to 30 days.
Neither are all Stratollites the same with mission capabilities that can range from days to weeks to months. A different version on a shorter mission than the one seen over Alamosa was measuring solar radiation for NASA along the Front Range and in northern Colorado a few weeks ago.
NASA and NOAA have used Stratollites to study the planet and space from the stratosphere to improve weather forecasting, to understand the impacts of solar radiation or measure long-term changes in our planet and her atmosphere. The U.S. Department of Defense and Homeland Security have used the ballons to meet intelligence and surveillance needs in protecting national security interests.
Stratollites can also be used for purposes that may not immediately come to mind, such as detecting and monitoring wildfire activity over long periods of time or helping to assess damage and assist in recovery efforts after a natural disaster – two scenarios that are becoming more and more frequent. The sky is [no longer] the limit.
As Wocken said, “We exist to inspire, create and explore new perspectives for a radically improved future.”
