Reader submission: Weather balloon lands in Lewis County after reaching stratosphere

On Aug. 9, Matt Hunter and Kyle Bastien had their long-awaited weather balloon launch day.

After months of preparation and testing, they were ready to go. The goal was to collect weather data, GPS and altitude recordings of the flight, along with camera footage of the stratosphere.

That morning, Hunter was on the phone with a Seattle air traffic controller to let all local pilots in the area know the flight plan and expected altitude. After the air traffic controller confirmed the launch, they filled the weather balloon with 125 liters of helium and detached the anchor.

At five minutes in and 15,000-foot altitude, they lost GPS signal of their balloon. Without it, there was little chance of recovery. Hunter called the air traffic controller to sadly inform them that the balloon was lost.

The projected flight plan from using NOAA data stated that the balloon should land about 15 miles west of Vader. Hunter and Bastien drove to Vader, hoping to catch a glimpse of the falling box with a red parachute. Following Google Maps, they were dismayed to find out that the forest roads they expected to drive through were owned by Sierra Pacific. Unfortunately, the GPS did not recover and they drove back up home to Renton.

That night, at midnight, suddenly the GPS module found satellite connection and sent out 12 hours of flight data. The balloon had landed about 2 miles from its intended target, deep within Sierra Pacific’s forest. It took over a week to finally contact Billy Langlois, the forest manager. Langlois was thrilled and set off after the GPS coordinates the next day. He found the balloon exactly where it said it should be, and graciously gave it back to Hunter and Bastien.

After all this ordeal, Hunter and Bastien were overjoyed to discover the cameras were intact and had recorded the entire flight. It stated its maximum height was 110,000 feet, well into the stratosphere. They wanted to extend their gratitude to Langlois and all the Lewis County contacts and connections that it took to retrieve their payload.

“We did it because: we’re both engineers who love space. This was the closest we could get to be astronauts,” Hunter said.

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