Balloons

Balloons are made of a thin polyethylene film and filled with helium. They carry observation instruments and float to altitudes three times as high as jet aircraft. The balloons have vents at the bottom. When they expand fully on reaching higher altitudes, excess gas is vented out to maintain a certain altitude. Most balloons use a thin film with a thickness of 20 µm (about the same as plastic shopping bags). Now, smaller balloons are being developed in order to float them to extremely high altitudes. For this purpose, we are currently testing materials with a thickness of 2.8 µm

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The large balloon B500 has a cubic volume of 500,000 m3 (about half the size of Tokyo Dome) with a diameter of 108 m.

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The B500 balloon can lift observation instruments weighing 500 kg to an altitude of 42 km. As of July 2007, the world record altitude reached by a balloon was 53.0 km, which was achieved by our balloon using thin polyethylene film with a thickness of 3.4 µm. It is listed in the Guinness Book of Records.

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It varies from a couple of hours to over 10 hours, and sometimes as long as several dozen hours.

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The main reasons include the increasing sizes of balloons, changes to the surrounding environment in terms of safety, and changes to airstreams.

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Balloons cannot be floated when it is raining, when there are strong winds (5 m/s or stronger), when there is poor visibility (8 km or less), or when airstream conditions are unfavorable.

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Big balloons are capable of remaining stable and making observations for dozens of hours at altitudes as high as 50 km, and thus are indispensible for making in-situ atmospheric observations. Balloons are also optimal for cutting-edge and unprecedented experiments as they are more economical than satellite launches and have a much shorter development lead time.

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