A marathon 14hr mission saw a launch from land & recovery from land although it was intended to be by sea, as temperature data was gathered over Zone 5-3S for Tiberdyne Aerospace
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Kerbal Space Agency
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bit.ly/KerBalloonProg… has accepted two contracts, both right along the shore so w/prevailing winds will launch on land, recover at sea
Kerbal Space Agency
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KB mission brief this morning was thrown into a bit of a tizzy when a crew member spotted a typo in launch site longitude coordinates. Oops!
Kerbal Space Agency
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Zone is still close enough to launch from land, so original mission remains a GO w/rover teams departing at 2nd sunrise for a 3hr drive
Kerbal Space Agency
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with the first hint of dawn on a moonless night, the KerBalloon UTVs depart w/Bill in the lead. They will be covering familiar terrain in the low light
Kerbal Space Agency
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until MSV Tongjess joins the mission later today, a relay airship will provide comms as distance is too great for a tethered comm balloon
Kerbal Space Agency
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at the launch site ~100km away, a balloon would need to be >8km high in order to be in sight of KSC: sqrt(h(600000*2+h))/1000 (h in meters)
Kerbal Space Agency
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UTVs checked in, all good. They can top out at around 18m/s on level ground but generally travel an average of around 12m/s over terrain
Kerbal Space Agency
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KB crew has setup camp after an uneventful 132km traverse & Progeny Mk4 is mounted, undergoing final readiness checks via Launch Control
Kerbal Space Agency
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MSV Tongjess has picked up Bob & the recovery crew, heading to bit.ly/Zone_5-3S-actu… for balloon launch as early as 3rd sunrise
Kerbal Space Agency
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starting to prep for KB launch, Tongjess relaying comms from land team. Have to launch this day cycle, but can wait if weather could improve
Kerbal Space Agency
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sun is up, launch conditions are reported to be less than ideal, so we will standby & KB team will monitor. They must launch by 22:20 UTC
Kerbal Space Agency
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although we hope conditions improve, always a chance they could worsen instead. Right now could be best! Wx sats will be a welcome thing...
Kerbal Space Agency
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KB team still sees clouds overhead but a relatively large patch of clear sky is coming so they have launched. Tracking Stn awaiting AOS
Kerbal Space Agency
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signal acquisition, balloon ascending nominally @ 5m/s passing now thru 7km. We expect it to head east, but land team ready to recover too
Kerbal Space Agency
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coming up on 18km, ascent is noticeably slowing already. Balloon far enough east UTVs are packing up to head home. Tongjess is tracking
Kerbal Space Agency
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caught in an upper-level air stream balloon is almost not ascending at all it's traveling horizontally so fast, moving at almost 20m/s!
Kerbal Space Agency
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envelope failure at only 22.4km. Tongjess nearby for recovery but ironically it looks like it could actually be coming down over land...
Kerbal Space Agency
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what are the chances?? Bob & recovery crew get to make landfall to recover the payload on this island, thankfully not too far inland
Kerbal Space Agency
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daylight is fading quick, but the team is no stranger to searching out balloon payloads in darkness. They still wish they had a UTV though!
Kerbal Space Agency
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locating the payload was thankfully not an issue & recovery team is hauling it back to the boat then back aboard Tongjess & heading home
Kerbal Space Agency
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Bill and the UTVs have stopped for the night, will continue their journey at 4th sunrise. Tongjess can travel @ night so will be back sooner
Kerbal Space Agency
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we have another relay airship coming on station as Tongjess is nearly back at KSC while UTV team is just breaking camp & rolling out shortly
Kerbal Space Agency
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Tongjess is back, dropping off Bob & crew. Here's a photo from the recovery boat as they approached the shore to hunt for the payload
Kerbal Space Agency
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aaand Bill is back with the UTVs, wrapping up this marathon mission. Did we break even? Eh, getting the science data was the important part!
Kerbal Space Agency
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everyone enjoy the weekend & hope for better weather! Catch up on this past week's activities via bit.ly/OpsSummary8-7-…
