As a Flying Squirrel takes off, I wonder “where did it go?” and what does the view from up there look like. Absent a camera, the FS2 GPS Data and Google Earth can provide an approximation of what our brave/foolish squirrel saw from “up there”. The video is best viewed in full screen and with […]
In addition to the detailed locations provided by the FSQ telemetry, Flying Squirrel #2 also sent WSPR messages 4 times an hour. WSPR is a very weak signal digital mode, often decoding signals below the noise (i.e. you can’t even hear the signal with your ears). The WSPR mode sends a position as Maidenhead Gris […]
Our brave squirrel #2 is now lost in the Mojave desert. Perhaps FS2 joined the army or needed to phone home via the Goldstone Deep space antenna network. The telemetry showed a deep decent at the end; indicating it was going to ground and the signal was probably lost because of mountains all around that […]
Gary W. produced a few graphs from the FS2 telemetry data that he received from the APRS.fi web site. The altitude (in feet) shows the deep, near death, dive bottoming out around the 86th data point. You can also clearly see the temp change upward at the same time period. Lower is warmer. […]
(This is a repost from the Facebook page.) FS2 was a very interesting (Strange) flight. FS2 flew a very slow circle around our launch site and then went in a northerly direction into Ft Irwin. FS went nowhere near the predicted path to the east. The balloon did not have the desired lift, so it […]
Weather is perfect, all systems go for launch at 10AM PDT. Latest prediction has moved slightly east of prior predictions. The path is following I-40 very closely. Stay tuned for actual launch/flight announcements Please follow and like us:
Updated Schedule 5/11/2018 This is the final FS2 Telemetry schedule. The columns labeled “Min” is the minutes into the hour (i.e. 0 = top of the hour) that the scheduled event should happen. The schedule repeats after 30 minutes. Launch is tentatively targeted for some time in May 2018. Stay tuned. Click this link for […]
Weather predicted for tomorrow’s launch of Flying Squirrel #2 continues to look very good. Winds will be light, and temperatures are in the upper 80s and low 90s which is mild for the desert this time of year. All is looking good! The predicted landing location has moved a bit north into the Mojave National […]
The Flying Squirrel #2 Mission
Intro Flying Squirrel #2 (FS2) high altitude balloon is planned for launch the morning of May 19th 2018 at 10AM (approx.) from Lucerne Dry lake bed in Lucerne Valley, CA. FS2 will send telemetry using WSPR to send 6-digit grid squares and uses the FSQ data mode to send more detailed position and telemetry data. […]
Weather forecasts continue to be good for launch on Saturday May 19th. Winds are predicted to be light. I ran a prediction comparing a theoretical launch today (May 16th) vs our planned launch on the 19th. I combined both predictions into a single graphic below. As you can see the winds today would carry the […]
