A realistic view of the future of scientific ballooning Original Research Article

The events of the past twenty years have brought about significant increases in the reliability of scientific balloon vehicles and operations. Scientists have enjoyed an unprecedented flight success ratio in recent years. Significant discoveries in the atmospheric science and space science disciplines have recently been made using balloon-borne instruments. Unfortunately, the number of balloon flights is decreasing each year and the number of new scientists using balloons is decreasing. In order for scientific ballooning to survive well into the twenty-first century, significant improvements must be made in the way technological advances are planned and coordinated. These improvements must be based on the needs of our customer scientists. This paper summarizes the technological advances made in recent years that will meet the ever growing needs of the science community. The advances in balloon technology include increased flight duration ability, heavy load capability using new launch techniques, and very high altitude capability using thin films. The advances have been driven largely by the development work in NASAʹs ULDB program. Other advances have improved the possibilities of building a successful stratospheric airship and also of building balloons for exploration of other planets.