Did the US Air Force take out an Amateur Radio balloon for $470,000?

Wow! The USAF is now killing ham radio!

And all this time I thought it was FT-8…..

 

Just don’t be borkin with the pico de gallo and nobody gets hurt.

 

Pico balloons makes sense, but since that has to be coordinated with the FAA before launch wouldn't the US Military be able to get that information if they don't already have it?

I'm not buy into they have problems tracking these balloons. If they could track one of the Gemini astronauts lost spacesuit glove, surely they can track something as big as a car sized balloon?

 

I always assumed it was the iPhone that killed HAM.

But an iPhone running an FT-8 application while dangling from a balloon... yeah, that would definitely do it.

 

You are assuming one hand can (or even will) talk to the other hand - if they even know what hand to talk to...

I'm a retired Zoomie, you have no idea how bad it can get when something (or anything) out of routine happens.....
People who 'live by the book' can get nearly catatonic with no 'rules or procedure' to follow. To be fair, pilots rarely suffer from this. Ground-based decision makers, OTOH...too often suffer from such. Many call it Politicitus or CYA disease....

 

Thanks for your service. I'm also a retired zoomie, 22+ years in Air Intelligence field. If an Amateur radio club launched a pico balloon they would have to notify the FAA. Seems to me that information would be available to civilian airlines and DoD and specifically to the Air Force through NOTAM.

 

I have seen it myself, the springbutts can suffer from paralysis when they might get some on them.

Forgot to mention, now is probably not a good time to be launching pico balloons, or any other balloons for that matter.

 

Possible. Given what the DOD and MOD have said, however, I don't believe they have much idea what they shot down. If anything.

 

Yeah - 23 years as Ground radio. The last half was spent mostly writing SOW/COTR work for a DIA unit with a single tour stint as a TACP radio mech for a break.

That's why I was laughing so hard. I thought it might have been a Beltway Bandit product that got smoked by 'accident'.

 

Near as I can tell the springbutts are paralyzed from the neck up.

 

I hear that the planet of Meep Zorp is none too happy about getting their intergalactic, self mobilizing, amateur time travelers, tic-tac repeater drone shot down. Boy, it's getting so you just cant do anything anymore without someone getting offended.

 

Yes tin foil hats will be in even greater demand then usual, might be good money!
Maybe some of the traditional sharpened wooden spears to poke at the sky gods, $50 apiece.
I personally will take all donations to the sky gods on anyone's behalf and make sure it's spent wisely to appease the sky gods.

 

It's always fun to watch some folks try to make a connection with almost anything in the news to ham radio.

 

Kinda like certain Zed pages?

 

The military is adding to the fun down here on the Gulf Coast.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.mi...ons-scrutiny-intensifies-over-flying.html/amp