Post by kiwithrottlejockey on Dec 15, 2014 8:29:37 GMT 12
from The Dominion Post....
Google loon balloons float over capital
8:52AM - Monday, 15 December 2014
LOON BALLOONS: The Google balloons, pictured here over the Southern Alps, have been floating
across Wellington and the Wairarapa.
A CLUSTER OF BALLOONS floating past Wellington overnight appear to be nothing more than internet “loon balloons”.
Wellingtonian Grant Weston spotted the balloons last night on a flight-tracking website, then saw them out of his window, almost stationary in the skies east of Wellington.
By this morning, most were over southern Wairarapa, while another had floated over the Pacific Ocean.
While website FlightRadar24.com renders the balloons as aircraft image, as planes, each was travelling at 12 knots or less and at heights near 20,000 metres — two slow and too high for conventional passenger aircraft.
The balloons were released in southern Canterbury during the weekend, and Simon and Ange Boorer of Temuka noticed two orbs high in the sky east of their house at 8.30am yesterday.
“I thought they might be weather balloons but they weren't moving. The moon shifted but they didn't,” Simon Boorer said.
An Airways spokeswoman said there had been sightings of similar objects in Waikuku and Oxford as well yesterday.
Eighteen Google loon balloons were released between 10pm on Saturday and 10am yesterday from Alexandra in Central Otago, she said.
“They are currently tracking north at 65,000 feet [19,812 metres] and that is likely to be what they are,” she said.
Project Loon involves floating 15-metre-wide balloons to offer access to affordable internet to remote regions they float over around the world.
You can track the balloons via FlightRadar24.com though it may take some practice and patience (flight registration 777777, Loon160 to Loon169).
• Read more: Project Loon.
www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/64156086/Google-loon-balloons-float-over-capital