Bursting the Bubble

Monday, March 07, 2016 at 12:00 AM ET

Verified

Key Takeaways:

Large scientific and weather balloons, often carrying payloads, pose an underappreciated collision risk to aircraft, particularly at high altitudes where they expand significantly.
The unpredictable drift of these balloons and poor coordination of their launches make them difficult for air traffic control to track and for pilots to avoid, even leading to near misses.
Despite a low frequency of reported collisions, pilots are urged to provide PIREPS (position, altitude, color, size) for any balloon sightings to help ATC advise other aircraft and enhance safety.

See a mistake? Contact us.

Not every threat is directly controlled by someone on the ground. Some are just lazily drifting about, riding the winds, rising into the skies on their own.

Of course, I’m talking about balloons. And not just party balloons either. Large balloons are used in many scientific fields, including meteorological research. An estimated 90,000 free balloons are released every year. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration alone launches 102 weather balloons from sites around the United States, the Caribbean, and the Pacific.