Posted on 10/15/2009 11:45:55 AM PDT by Arec Barrwin
Rescuers are tracking and chasing a "homemade flying saucer" that is in flight with a 6-year-old, by himself, on board.
The incident started this morning in Fort Collins when the boy got into the balloon-like device, which was built by an adult, and it came loose from a tether, according to the Larimer County Sheriff's Office.
The contraption could rise as high as 10,000 feet, the sheriff's office said.
The home-made flying saucer was last seen in flight over Weld County.
The sheriff's office is working the Federal Aviation Administration to determine how to best get the boy down.
The homemade airplane was tethered in Fort Collins when the boy got onboard and it floated away. (Lisa Ecklund via 9News)
The six-year-old boy was by himself on board the hommade aircraft. (Courtesy Lisa Ecklund, via 9News)
The craft could fly as high as 10,000 feet, according to the Weld County Sheriff's Office. (Lisa Ecklund via 9News)
“I think the caller might be on to something there”
Then again, he may just be ON something.
Prayers for the boy of course.
Police say there are pegs on the bottom of the aircraft that indicate that a box was attached at some point.
This is confusing - first they say he was in the batter compartment, shown on your diagram, and then they reference an attached box.
http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=125161&catid=339
google maps shows a reservoir (pretty good sized) sse of the home.. maybe a mile or so...??????????????
True, but the point is that with the extra weight of the child how could it have enough lift? IOW there wasn’t obviously enough lift to keep it aloft when it came down. How could it have lifted off with another 50 pounds?
From CNN.com:
“At this point, we are thinking that he did not fall out of the balloon and is somewhere on the ground,” Larimer County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Eloise Campanella said. “The basket itself was not breached. It does not look like he fell out of it, but again, this is all conjecture.” Watch balloon land »
Campanella said authorities are searching the neighborhood for the boy.
“I’m very confident we will find him. I think it’s a matter of him being a little scared,” she said. “Maybe he’s not ready to be found.” Watch the balloon float thousands of feet over Colorado »
This picture - is it what I think it may look like?
http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff221/renderplex/WHoa.jpg
(not sure how to embed a photo)
Local news reporting weight of boy at 37-40 pounds.
“1 cubic meter of helium at sea level has a lift of about 1 kg”
Right, but that is at sea level. Denver is not at sea level, it is about 6,000 feet up. Not sure exactly what the capacity is at 6,000 ft, but I found this chart, that places it between 0.35 and 1.00/m3.
Altitude (m) Altitude (ft) Buoyancy (kg/m^3)
0 0 ~1
10,000 32,000 0.356055
20,000 66,000 0.076556
30,000 98,000 0.015852
35,000 115,000 0.00728742
Also, consider that if the craft was near its peak load when it was on the ground, it couldn’t possibly reach anywhere near the peak altitude of the unladen craft, it would top out at a much lower altitude and hover there before starting to sink.
I don’t get the point.
The “Expert” said it couldn’t have lifted the kid...that was his opinion.
Now you’re changing the argument (or whatever the point is) to talking about a piloted balloon (helium balloon in the common sense are rarely used nowadays, they are hybrids because helium is relatively expensive to continually vent to the air)
Nobody was in control of this homemade contraption except the slow leak it apparently developed
If he were, he would have been dead within 50-60 seconds. (but there is no way he could have gotten in)
That would have to be a heck of a lot of helium as the kid would be at least 3 times the weight of craft.
all there was on the bottom of the box was a metal rod about 12” long give or take coming out of the center. Being a weather balloon it was likely an antenna or lightning rod.
A neighbor said the two brothers were up on the roof with video cameras and they were very sure that their little brother was in the balloon. I posited that they talked him into it, untied the tethers, and got out their cameras.
Is there confirmation that the parents planned this and were present?
Any word on the boy’s condition?
Admittedly, I was skeptical at first, but the longer this goes on, I'm having more doubts about finding the child alive. We're now ... what... >4 hours since the kid has been seen?
“Someone just called Hannity’s show, and did some rough math on the volume of the balloon,”
Followed by the cry of “Baba Booey” no doubt.
>>Then again, he may just be ON something.
I was driving, so I didn’t have access to the ability to look up the necessary background information- and my in-my-head trig isn’t that hot after this many years out of school. Your comment seems to suggest that you have better numbers. Care to share?
The point is that with the extra weight of the child how could it have enough lift? IOW there wasn’t obviously enough lift to keep it aloft when it came down. How could it have lifted off with another 50 pounds?
Does anyone know what color clothes he was wearing. I saved the picture on my computer and zoomed in. It looks like there is a green color in that speck.
What was he wearing?
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