ARLA/CLUSTER: Radio-balão de amador realiza a 1º circumnavegação ao Hemisfério Norte e continua a voar a caminho da 2ª.

[João Costa > CT1FBF]

434 MHz balloon B-64 returning to UK again

Radio amateur Leo Bodnar M0XER launched his solar powered balloon
B-64, carrying an 11 gram transmitter payload, from Silverstone in the
UK at 06:51 UT on July 12, 2014 and it's still flying.

It completed its first circumnavigation of the Northern Hemisphere at
16:30 UT on Friday, July 31 and is expected to complete the second
circumnavigation in the next couple of days.

On the afternoon of Thursday, August 21 the balloon was just west of
Reykjavik in Iceland heading south at an altitude of 12,500 metres.
Radio amateurs in the British Isles are invited to listen out for the
balloon which may come in range late Friday or on Saturday.

B-64 transmits 10 mW on 434.500 MHz using the amateur radio data modes
Contestia 64/1000 and APRS (M0XER-4).

Leo has utilised some clever techniques storing positions when the
balloon is out of radio contact then later transmitting a log file of
previous locations in the comments field of the APRS packet. This
enables a fairly complete path to be built up. B-64 only stores 5 days
worth of data, where you get a straight line on the track it has been
out of radio contact.

The path of the balloon over the past 6 weeks can be seen on the UKHAS
tracker at
http://spacenear.us/tracker/flyb.php

An APRS map showing the past 24 hours is at
http://aprs.fi/#!mt=roadmap&z=11&call=a%2FM0XER-4&timerange=86400&tail=86400

Listen for B-64 online using the SUWS WebSDR, further details at
http://amsat-uk.org/2014/08/15/suws-websdr-moves-to-new-site/

Additional high altitude balloon links at
http://amsat-uk.org/2014/08/21/
434-mhz-balloon-b-64-returning-to-uk-again/