WOW bizarre event in colorado...

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  1. Hindsight is always 100%, but put yourself in the shoes of the 911 dispatcher and the emergency response folks on the receiving end of the 911 call. I'm sure is was very real and scary for them.
  2. Most aviation folks know helium will lift approximately 1 ounce per cubic foot at 32F MSL and the reported size of the balloon was 20' diameter and 5' high.
  3. A quick check from medical folks will reveal that the average 6 year old boy is 42" tall and weights 46 pounds.
  4. The 5 second back-of-the-envelop emergency response sanity check on whether this report was plausible or a prank is to approximate the balloon lifting power as 20*20*5*(3/4)/16 = 1500/16 = 94 pounds at sea level. This is greater than that the weight of a six year old so from an emergency response point based on a 911 call, it had to be taken seriously.
  5. As you are planning you method of response you can refine your calculations.
  6. Helium will actually lift 1.1 ounce per cubic foot at 32F MSL
  7. The lifting capacity of helium decrease with increasing altitude.
  8. The lifting power of helium decreases with increasing temperature.
  9. At an altitude of 5000' ASL and a temperature the lifting power had dropped to 0.85 oz. per cubic foot.
  10. Without knowing any more details, you perform a better 30 second approximation by correcting the lifting power for temperature and altitude. Without more information and assuming the balloon volume as a cylinder, the lifting power of the balloon is 1570 cuft. * 0.85 oz./cuft. * 1/16 lb/oz. = 83 pounds, a lower but still a credible number.
  11. This is enough to get the emergence response aircraft to respond.
  12. Even as the chase planes observed an ellipsoidal shape, the calculated volume is reduced to 1045 cuft but a quick calculation would show that the balloon could lift 55 pounds so from an emergency response point the report is still credible and the balloon is still capable of lifting a 6 year old boy so the search had to continue until the boy or the body was found.
Regardless of what this nut says about this event not being a hoax, the emergency response folks had to take it seriously and react quickly based on the information they were receiving, and their response was rapid and costly. I really hope they nail him with the bill for the response expenses his irresponsible behavior incurred.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifting_gas

https://www.aerospaceweb.org/design/scripts/atmosphere/

https://www.disabled-world.com/artman/publish/height-weight-teens.shtml

https://www.csgnetwork.com/volumeellipsoid.html
 
[Not at sea level... Denver is the 'mile high city'... so the balloon was capable of lifting less weight than at MSL...

Not arguing that you have to take it seriously... the cops/dispatchers/other first responders ABSOLUTELY did the right thing... I've been riding shotgun in a cop car doing 80 MPH across town blowing through intersections and busy streets, side streets through neighborhoods, and all that going to a robbery alarm across town where all we could do was I looked out the passenger window and the other officer watched out the driver's window calling 'clear' at each intersection as we blew through town to get there, and just praying that nobody was coming, because there was NO WAY we could stop if there was... but like my buddy said, "hey, EVERY alarm is REAL until proven otherwise!" Lemme tell you THAT kind of driving will give you gray hair QUICK!!! 140 on the freeway is FUN, 80 mph through city streets is suicidal!

BUT, they SHOULD investigate to see if this was a hoax, and if it was, prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law... and file suit against them to recover ALL (or as much as possible anyway) of the expenses spent on the search and rescue efforts. They CANNOT make up for the risks to the first responder's lives taken during the search, the time wasted, and the gut wrenching and inconvenience inflicted on others, but they SHOULD be forced to repay the monetary expenditures on their little 'folly' if it should be proved to be a hoax... Just like that 'runaway bride' that everybody was convinced had been kidnapped and killed in Alabama (or wherever it was-- Georgia, Mississippi, Louisana, can't recall ATM) and turned out she ran off and was sipping Margaritas on the beach somewhere or something like that; had faked the whole thing! They were going after her with both barrells last I heard when the news quit covering the story...

I just don't understand some folks' willingness to 'turn a blind eye' to this sort of thing... We had some stupid kids in North Houston steal a schoolbus because they wanted to drive down to Galveston and go to the beach a few summers back. They stole the bus, took off for the 70 mile drive south, and while on the freeway a cop passed them, so they got scared and exited the freeway and drove out through some neighborhoods to 'lose the cops' (the cops were never 'on' them-- they didn't know the bus was stolen yet) and ended up at the end of a little cowpath road behind some subdivision at a gate to a cow pasture, and couldn't turn around... so they opened the gate and drove out into the pasture to turn the bus around, and got it stuck in the mud. They spun the tires until they overheated and the tires caught on fire, and burned the bus to the ground. The kids just walked away and got one of their dopey friends to come get them and take them home. The bus was a total loss... the cops figured out who did it and arrested them, and they were being charged for stealing the bus, and the school was sueing to recover the cost of the $80,000 schoolbus they burned up...

They were interviewing folks at a local gas station, and I was amazed at the MORONIC responses of most of the people they talked to... "kids will be kids" and all this sort of stupidity!!! HELLO!!! That's $80K in TAXES that just went up in smoke, and isn't available to educate your kids, ensure they have a safe bus to ride home on, etc...

I guess I'm just too 'old school'... :) OL JR :)

PS... I agree with Bob here... I just get too fired up about this kind of stuff sometimes :)
 
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bobkrech said:
  1. Hindsight is always 100%, but put yourself in the shoes of the 911 dispatcher and the emergency response folks on the receiving end of the 911 call. I'm sure is was very real and scary for them.
Click to expand...

You've got to admire anyone who can take a call like this and not treat the person like a nut.

Dispatcher: Ma'am, what's your name?
Mayumi Heene: My name is Mayumi Heene.
Dispatcher: Ok. And you're at the 5434 Fossil Ridge Drive Now?... And so it was an experimental plane?
MH: It's a flying saucer.
Dispatcher: It's a flying saucer? And that's gone too, right? Is the flying saucer gone as well?
 
Hangin' 's to good for 'em, burnin' 's too good for 'em, they should be torn into itty bitty little pieces an' buried alive!
Hannover Fiste
I think Jon Stewart said it best, "Hooray, they found the Balloon Boy,(with a snarl)Now let's get 'im". Ted
 
luke strawwalker said:
BUT, they SHOULD investigate to see if this was a hoax, and if it was, prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law... and file suit against them to recover ALL (or as much as possible anyway) of the expenses spent on the search and rescue efforts. They CANNOT make up for the risks to the first responder's lives taken during the search, the time wasted, and the gut wrenching and inconvenience inflicted on others, but they SHOULD be forced to repay the monetary expenditures on their little 'folly' if it should be proved to be a hoax.
Click to expand...

Ding ding ding ding. :clap::clap::clap::clap:

WHATEVER side of the "tea bagger" debate you happen to be on, virtually everybody, that is, 99.99999998% of the populace, can agree this was an idiotic attention-whoring stunt which burned up thousands and thousands and thousands (hell, maybe millions when all the overtime costs for highly-specialized personnel are added in) of dollars of public money, tied up public safety agencies all day, and the law needs to come after Daddy like a ton of bricks, stomp on him with both feet, recover every nickel they can out of his hide.

:bangbang::bangbang::bangbang::bangbang:

And the rocketry community needs to come down on him with both feet too, emphasize loud and long publicly that he was not a nut BECAUSE he played with weather balloons and rockets -- he was a nut who HAPPENED to play with weather balloons and rockets.

There are nuts who play with cars, and sometimes they go out and kill themselves (or others) with them. Does that mean we should ban cars?

This is why the YouTube videos with all those idiots blowing up stupid rocket stunts, and the people who stage rocket stunts which are highly likely (or almost guaranteed) to fail disastrously, tick me off -- they make us all look like nuts, and gives traction to the people who want to clamp down on rocketry, if not ban it altoghether.

If Daddy is a member of NAR or TRA, he needs to be publicly expelled.
 
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bobkrech said:
  1. Hindsight is always 100%, but put yourself in the shoes of the 911 dispatcher and the emergency response folks on the receiving end of the 911 call. I'm sure is was very real and scary for them.
Click to expand...


  1. Definitely. I certainly didn't mean to imply that the 911 call should have been ignored, or anything like that. Obviously that's out of the question.

    I still don't understand why after the fact, though, both the police and the media watched bad acting and called it convincing and sincere. I suppose in the case of the police it could be simply that the reporter talking to them pressed them to say something, and of course they couldn't accuse the guy right there (though in that case I'd think they might just go with "we have no comment on that at this time"). Or maybe they felt a need to justify their serious response, and didn't feel they could go with "we could tell the guy was faking, but we're obliged to pretend otherwise when we receive an emergency call".

    Yeah, I guess there were reasons to pretend to believe him. I'm still pretty amazed to hear that, though. But again, I haven't had to sit through TV news for a few years, so my standards might be unrealistically high.
 
JStarStar said:
If Daddy is a member of NAR or TRA, he needs to be publicly expelled.
Click to expand...

So what did this stunt have to do with Rocketry or the NAR or TRA codes?

You can't get booted for being a stupid moronic idiot.........that is...unless you do with with a rocket.

I think they should put both of the parents in jail for a couple of months with absolutly no contact or information of what happened to their kids. See how they respond to that........that will teach them for using the kids as bait.

I'm just say'n....;)
 
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sylvie369 said:
I still don't understand why after the fact, though, both the police and the media watched bad acting and called it convincing and sincere.

Yeah, I guess there were reasons to pretend to believe him.\.
Click to expand...


It's called CYA... public officials that 'make accusations' without foundation can find themselves sued for libel or official oppression...

Once you have enough probably cause to get a warrant, make an arrest, or press charges, THEN you're ok...

Cross every "I" dot every "T" :D OL JR :)
 
Bravo52 said:
So what did this stunt have to do with Rocketry or the NAR or TRA codes?

You can't get booted for being a stupid F'n moronic idiot.........that is...unless you do with with a rocket.

I think they should put both of the parents in jail for a couple of months with absolutly no contact or information of what happened to their kids. See how they respond to that........that will teach them for using the kids as bait.

I'm just say'n....;)
Click to expand...

Well, isn't launching into thunderstorms a safety code violation, and can't you be booted for safety code violations, especially multiple intentional safety code violations??

Doubt he's a member anyway... so probably a moot point... :rolleyes: OL JR :)
 
Bravo52 said:
So what did this stunt have to do with Rocketry or the NAR or TRA codes?
Click to expand...

The first image of the dingbat plastered all over the nationwide media was of him with a MPR and the kids with Estes Patriots.

The reason to expel him (if he is in fact a member) is to deliver the message that the NAR or TRA does not tolerate idiocy of this sort, and does not wish to asscociate with those who do.

Of course if he wants to do goofy stuff with rockets probably nobody can stop him, but at least NAR and TRA would be on record as wanting nothing to do with him. If he's allowed to remain a member then at some point some media guy looking to dig up dirt on his "dingbat activities" will latch onto rocketry and cite the failure of the national organizations to expel him as some kind of implicit endorsement of his activities.
 
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JStarStar said:
The first image of the dingbat plastered all over the nationwide media was of him with a MPR and the kids with Estes Patriots.

The reason to expel him (if he is in fact a member) is to deliver the message that the NAR or TRA does not tolerate idiocy of this sort, and does not wish to asscociate with those who do.

Of course if he wants to do goofy stuff with rockets probably nobody can stop him, but at least NAR and TRA would be on record as wanting nothing to do with him. If he's allowed to remain a member then at some point some media guy looking to dig up dirt on his "dingbat activities" will latch onto rocketry and cite the failure of the national organizations to expel him as some kind of implicit endorsement of his activities.
Click to expand...

I agree.

I'm not one for "throwing people under the bus", but this guy did all of this to himself. He's about to be criminally charged, and DCYS, or whatever it is in Colorado, are looking at how they can take his kids away. We should get as far away from him as possible.
 
Wolf Blitzer is an IDIOT! He should have been all over that when the kid said, " I thought we were doing this for the show."
Even old man Larry King would have caught that comment from the kid.
I don't know how Blitzer became head news guy at CNN (says a lot about the management there) after the kid's response went over his head. But then again, did anybody see Blitzer on Jeopardy a while ago? Boy, he's a smart one!
 
JStarStar said:
The reason to expel him (if he is in fact a member) is to deliver the message that the NAR or TRA does not tolerate idiocy of this sort, and does not wish to asscociate with those who do.

Of course if he wants to do goofy stuff with rockets probably nobody can stop him, but at least NAR and TRA would be on record as wanting nothing to do with him. If he's allowed to remain a member then at some point some media guy looking to dig up dirt on his "dingbat activities" will latch onto rocketry and cite the failure of the national organizations to expel him as some kind of implicit endorsement of his activities.
Click to expand...

Ahhh......so what if he was just ugly?

Listen, what you are proposing is wrong. Plain and simple. If...and this is a big if...the moron is a member, then NAR and TRA would have to change the rules just to dump the dude because they don't like him. I could be wrong (and am quite often) but someone needs to tell us if there is a "general purpose clause" in the rules that allows NAR/TRA to ban people. I believe they call this the proverbial "slippery slope"......

Don't get me wrong, if the guy is guilty, then someone should take him out back and explain things to him up close and personal. However, the reality is the guy didn't do anything wrong with a rocket (in this case). There is a big difference.

I'm not taking up for this dude, I'm just saying this is not related to NAR or TRA. It's unfortunate the first picture shown had rockets in it. What do you want to do next, ban cars just because he drove one once?

All NAR/TRA has to do is go on record saying they disapprove. I don't think they have the legal standing to boot him. In fact, I would encourage the leadership to do this. I think it would be in our best interest.
 
Bravo52 said:
All NAR/TRA has to do is go on record saying they disapprove. I don't think they have the legal standing to boot him. In fact, I would encourage the leadership to do this. I think it would be in our best interest.
Click to expand...

Even that would be too much. No need to jump on the bandwagon. Just ignore him and he'll fade away.
 
seriously...98% of the people watching the news about this dont even know what TRA or NAR are...just ignore it i say.

wolf blitzer? im an avid jeopardy fan, he finished what, like -4800? but they still let him play final jeopardy because it was for a charity. haha. awesome showing though.
 
Google
"Wolf Blitzer is an idiot"
and over 54,000 items appear. I am not alone!
 
I wonder who will be the first manufacturer to offer a scale kit of the 'Flying Saucer".

Perhaps EMRR could have a scratch built contest.
 
We thought about creating a flying saucer balloon kit if only because we could plug it with "As Seen on TV."

-- Roger
 
One more thing about the Balloon Boy Incident. How big was the balloon? It sure didn't look big enough to carry the weight of a 6 year old kid. Law enforcement / news outlets should have brought this up.
 
DanFrank said:
One more thing about the Balloon Boy Incident. How big was the balloon? It sure didn't look big enough to carry the weight of a 6 year old kid. Law enforcement / news outlets should have brought this up.
Click to expand...

Commentators in the media, both during and after the event, did mention that they didn't think the balloon was large enough and that it didn't look like it had any bulky weight in it. I suspect that law enforcement people came to the same conclusion, but they couldn't, for obvious reasons, take any chances.

-- Roger
 
I read yesterday on Yahoo that the mom signed a confession that the whole thing was a hoax... and that the confession could NOT be used against her husband and that she could NOT testify against him WITHOUT HIS PERMISSION... :y: WTF?? Colorado must have some strange evidentiary rules!

They said the whole thing's being referred to the DA for possible charges. They could file four felony counts against him with a total possible punishment of a few years in prison and up to $500,000 in fines, and they CAN possibly go after him for the reimbursement of the expenses of the search and rescue efforts...

They also said that declaring bankruptcy would NOT obviate the requirement to repay any reimbursement judgements for the search and rescue efforts... those judgements are durable and remain in effect permanently...

So, any future money he might make off this fiasco would go back to the agencies involved in the rescue efforts... Looks like if he was trying to make money he just ended up losing a ton of it, and if he was looking for fame only found notoriety... Serves him right...

Later! OL JR :)
 
luke strawwalker said:
I read yesterday on Yahoo that the mom signed a confession that the whole thing was a hoax... and that the confession could NOT be used against her husband and that she could NOT testify against him WITHOUT HIS PERMISSION... :y: WTF?? Colorado must have some strange evidentiary rules!
Click to expand...

Standard rules of evidence say that a married person cannot be compelled to testify against their spouse. Maybe they just had an odd way of expressing that.
 
Peartree said:
Standard rules of evidence say that a married person cannot be compelled to testify against their spouse. Maybe they just had an odd way of expressing that.
Click to expand...

Yes, I'm aware of that Pear from my cop days, but that's not what it said... it said that "she COULD NOT testify against him WITHOUT HIS PERMISSION"... that is significantly different from "she cannot be COMPELLED to testify against her husband IF SHE CHOOSES NOT TO."

Perhaps your right that it's poorly worded... couldn't IMAGINE the stupid media screwing up something like simple wording could we?? :roll::roll::roll:
But, that has to be a pretty screwed up editor that wouldn't catch it... and a REALLY dumb reporter to phrase it that way to begin with... it implies that 1)she COULD testify against her husband (which is true in either case, because she COULD choose to testify, or CHOOSE NOT TO, but in the latter case cannot be COMPELLED by the court to testify against her husband or face contempt of court charges) and 2) that even if she CHOSE to testify against her husband, she WOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO UNLESS HER HUSBAND GAVE HIS PERMISSION for her to testify against him... which is a TOTALLY different ball of wax and has to be about the stupidest thing I've ever heard of... who would ALLOW someone permission to testify AGAINST them in a criminal proceeding if they could DENY such permission?? Makes no sense, but then again, this is from the MEDIA, which means your assertion, Pear, is probably correct.

Knowing how things work, and knowing the the CPS was brought in to 'assess the safety of the children's environment" I'd lay odds that CPS and/or the investigating authorities "leaned on her" and told her if she didn't come clean about the hoax that they'd take her kids... Certainly isn't out of the ordinary for 'good cop/bad cop scenarios'... I've seen bigger games played before...

Take it easy! OL JR :)
 
With all due respect to the members of the media, assuming that ALL members of the media are intelligent and thoughtful...


...is probably NOT a good assumption.:)
 

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