French team of balloonists waiting in a "Jamesway" portable shelter for the weather to calm down on the sea ice adjacent to McMurdo Station. This team of 9 French scientists from CNES (Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales) & CNRS (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) launching a 10-meter diameter closed helium balloon that will circulate 20Km altitude above Antarctica (lower stratosphere, commercial jets travel at 12Km). Instruments in the gondola measure temp, pressure, and position every 15 minutes traveling at speeds up to 200Km/hr at the edge of the polar vortex. Vortex encloses the ozone hole in the atmosphere, and will eventually move towards S. America (Argentina & Chile) in Nov/Dec. The vortex breaks up there. Balloons will self-destruct just before their battery dies. The balloons cannot travel further north due to a lack of permits from nations they would otherwise overfly. They need light winds (under 10Km/hr) to safely launch the $100,000 experimental balloon/gondolas.
- Filename
- STNMTZ_20051006_RAW15143.tif
- Copyright
- © 2006 George Steinmetz
- Image Size
- 6144x4087 / 71.9MB
- www.georgesteinmetz.com
- Contained in galleries
- Antarctica
