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Not a mooney story, but cool night in aviation.

Austintatious

By Austintatious
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Austintatious Experienced

Austintatious

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Posted

So I was on the last leg of a LONG day last night.  We were dead heading home into some gnarly winds.  Went up to FL510 to try to get out of them and got a great view of the meteor shower.

Then, the completely unexpected happens... ATC says " Got some interesting traffic for you, Google Balloon 100' below your altitude at 1 o clock 15 miles."

You just NEVER have any traffic up there.  We were able to see it on TCAS and visually as it had lights on in.

 

Sorry, pic will not upload right side up

20191214_223634.thumb.jpg.e867fad80934a849d5f426c5335f0bd4.jpgFun night!

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N201MKTurbo
N201MKTurbo

I was flying back from somewhere in SoCal back in the 90s. I was IFR at 13000 and center calls out 747 traffic 5 miles away and 4000 feet higher. I thought it was odd that they would call out traffic

cujet
cujet

FL510 in G650ER S/N 6205 over Florida on it's "cold soak" flight.  Interesting thread, as it addresses rapid cabin pressure loss also. I'm one of the very lucky people who has experienced multipl

Austintatious
Austintatious

So I was on the last leg of a LONG day last night.  We were dead heading home into some gnarly winds.  Went up to FL510 to try to get out of them and got a great view of the meteor shower. Then,

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N201MKTurbo Grand Master

N201MKTurbo

Posted
Posted

I was flying back from somewhere in SoCal back in the 90s. I was IFR at 13000 and center calls out 747 traffic 5 miles away and 4000 feet higher. I thought it was odd that they would call out traffic that far away. It was the space shuttle on top of its carrier. I said "Traffic in sight - Thanks!"

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alextstone Mentor

alextstone

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, Austintatious said:

So I was on the last leg of a LONG day last night.  We were dead heading home into some gnarly winds.  Went up to FL510 to try to get out of them and got a great view of the meteor shower.

Then, the completely unexpected happens... ATC says " Got some interesting traffic for you, Google Balloon 100' below your altitude at 1 o clock 15 miles."

You just NEVER have any traffic up there.  We were able to see it on TCAS and visually as it had lights on in.

 

Sorry, pic will not upload right side up

20191214_223634.thumb.jpg.e867fad80934a849d5f426c5335f0bd4.jpgFun night!

What the heck are you flying at FL510?!?!

 

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MooneyMitch Grand Master

MooneyMitch

Posted
Posted

This is so interesting!  A Google balloon?  Lights on?  Transponder? ADS-B ? :lol:  Someone enlighten me  on what the purpose/operation of this Google balloon is all about please.  Obviously, I'm living in the dark ages still......... :ph34r:  :lol:

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EricJ Grand Master

EricJ

Posted
Posted (edited)
11 minutes ago, MooneyMitch said:

This is so interesting!  A Google balloon?  Lights on?  Transponder? ADS-B ? :lol:  Someone enlighten me  on what the purpose/operation of this Google balloon is all about please.  Obviously, I'm living in the dark ages still......... :ph34r:  :lol:

They show up on flightradar24 and can be tracked there.    They go all over the place and have been for a few years or so now.   It's impressive how well they can navigate them.

EDIT:  BTW, they're big and reflective enough that they can often be seen if you know where to look.    If you see one near you on flightradar24 and it's down-sun, they're not too hard to spot.

Edited by EricJ
N201MKTurbo Grand Master

N201MKTurbo

Posted
Posted
3 minutes ago, EricJ said:

They show up on flightradar24 and can be tracked there.    They go all over the place and have been for a few years or so now.   It's impressive how well they can navigate them.

EDIT:  BTW, they're big and reflective enough that they can often be seen if you know where to look.    If you see one near you on flightradar24 and it's down-sun, they're not too hard to spot.

I wonder how many of the recent UFO sightings are Google balloons?

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EricJ Grand Master

EricJ

Posted
Posted
32 minutes ago, MooneyMitch said:

Ah ha!!  Thank you.  Elon Musk, Space X internet satellites will more than likely replace these balloons soon !  Very awesome overall !! :D

Astronomers really hope not.

 

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Ragsf15e Grand Master

Ragsf15e

Posted
Posted
6 hours ago, Austintatious said:

So I was on the last leg of a LONG day last night.  We were dead heading home into some gnarly winds.  Went up to FL510 to try to get out of them and got a great view of the meteor shower.

Then, the completely unexpected happens... ATC says " Got some interesting traffic for you, Google Balloon 100' below your altitude at 1 o clock 15 miles."

You just NEVER have any traffic up there.  We were able to see it on TCAS and visually as it had lights on in.

 

Sorry, pic will not upload right side up

20191214_223634.thumb.jpg.e867fad80934a849d5f426c5335f0bd4.jpgFun night!

That’s cool!

Whats your time of useful consciousness up there, 10 seconds?!  Be safe!

Austintatious Experienced

Austintatious

Posted
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30 minutes ago, Ragsf15e said:

That’s cool!

Whats your time of useful consciousness up there, 10 seconds?!  Be safe!

ohh, no i don't think it is that long.  Of course it depends on the decompression rate.

here is a pretty interesting video of a rapid decompression to FL450 ... they delay the mask dropping to simulate response time.

 

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75_M20F Rising Star

75_M20F

Posted
Posted
45 minutes ago, Ragsf15e said:

That’s cool!

Whats your time of useful consciousness up there, 10 seconds?!  Be safe!

Wikipedia says you have 5 seconds with a rapid decompression Yikes!!!

carusoam Grand Master

carusoam

Posted
Posted

The brain has a lot of O2 in it...

it doesn’t evaporate under normal decompression situations...

It takes a while to deplete, minutes not seconds...

But... in the vacuum of space... losing pressure... is not an O2 problem as much as it is a boiling point problem... all that water has a tendency to evaporate.... at ordinary room temperatures...

PP thoughts only...

Best regards,

-a-

Ibra Mentor

Ibra

Posted
Posted

I think ATC was excited to give you something on that long boring direct, sorry no U2, Blackbird, Concord...this time but I found a Google Balloon for you :D

takair Grand Master

takair

Posted
Posted
7 hours ago, Austintatious said:

not sure what that is, but not a g650

It’s the Dassault EASY II version of the PlaneView system...so likely a Falcon.  Your picture brings back memories.  Spent many hours in the G450/550 simulators working in Savannah as part of the team developing and certifying the synthetic vision and many other features in the cockpit that made its way into the 650.

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