Super Pressure Balloon

While local weather in Wanaka, New Zealand, is almost always lovely for locals and visitors alike, NASA's Super Pressure Balloon team continues to evaluate multiple weather conditions, all of which need to align before moving into a launch attempt. Wind conditions at the surface level need to be light in order to facilitate work on …

NASA's super pressure balloon team remains flight ready in Wanaka, New Zealand, waiting for weather conditions to set up that will support a launch attempt. The team began working a launch attempt Saturday, April 9, however the winds did not set up in a direction that would facilitate laying out the 250-meter balloon flight train …

WANAKA, New Zealand – NASA postponed the scheduled launch of its super pressure balloon (SPB) from Wanaka, New Zealand, at 6:30 a.m. Saturday, April 9 (New Zealand time) due to unacceptable weather conditions for operations. Launch preparations began at midnight by mounting the payload's solar arrays and attaching the gondola to the bottom of the …

NASA is targeting Saturday, April 9 (Friday, April 8 in Eastern Time), to conduct a super pressure balloon (SPB) test flight launching from Wanaka Airport, New Zealand, on a potentially 100-day journey. Forecast surface and low-level winds are currently marginal for supporting a launch attempt. NASA will begin flight preparations in the early morning hours …

Weather update: No super pressure balloon launch attempt for Friday, April 8, due to poor weather; officials will meet Friday afternoon to determine if Saturday's weather will support a launch attempt from Wanaka, New Zealand. (All dates are New Zealand). The primary mission of NASA's super pressure balloon (SPB) flight from Wanaka, New Zealand, is …

NASA's super pressure balloon team in Wanaka, New Zealand, continues to evaluate weather daily for conditions that could support a launch attempt of the pumpkin-shaped, football-stadium-sized balloon. At this time, the weather running through Thursday, April 7, will not support a launch attempt. Weekend weather is showing some potential, but the final call for any …

Weather. Most of us are content with tuning into the news, picking up a newspaper, opening up a smartphone app, or perhaps even relying on a trick knee to get a general sense of the day's weather outlook. Cloudy, sunny, rainy, windy, snowy. Pleasant, frigid, heat wave, cold snap. With the daily forecast in hand, …

Dr. Steven Boggs, professor and head of the Department of Physics, University of California, Berkeley, describes the objectives of the Compton Spectrometer and Imager (COSI), a gamma-ray telescope set for liftoff to the near space environment via a NASA super pressure balloon. The balloon launch is scheduled for no earlier than Monday, April 4, from Wanaka, …

Technicians with NASA's Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility (CSBF) reached a major milestone Wednesday, March 30, after successfully completing an instrument compatibility test in preparation for launching a super pressure balloon from Wanaka, New Zealand. The daylong test, also referred to as a hang test because it involves suspending the payload from the launch crane and …

NASA's Balloon Program Team runs through a few fun facts about its super pressure balloon, scheduled to launch from Wanaka, New Zealand, in the following video: