The recovery of high altitude balloon payload VE3LCA-11
by Ray Makul, K1XV

On Sunday, November 8th, I was out enjoying a pleasant day.  I got home about 3pm.  On my telephone voice mail was a message from someone unknown to me, Barrie Crampton, VE3BSB.    It was a short message, and a little cryptic.  Barrie is out of Perth, Ontario, about 50 miles southwest of Ottawa, the Capital of Canada.

What Barrie told me was that a high altitude balloon was launched from Perth the day before, and it had come down somewhere in our area after being last tracked on the W1UWS Digi-peater,   He called me because I was listed as CVFMA President on our web site.  As many of you are aware, the W1UWS was equipped earlier this year with digi-peater capability, making it a ground station for our part of the world, capable of pumping signals from APRS transponders into the world wide APRS (Automatic Position Reporting System) network.

I am the first to admit that I am aware of, but not particularly expert in, APRS matters.  Well, I got on the APRS websites, and found a Google map of the area showing the location of APRS transponders in our area.  Low and behold, there was a balloon symbol, identifying the signal source as VE3LCA-11, still being picked up by W1UWS.  It was in a wooded area, between two streams, about 3 miles southeast of my home QTH, and about 1500 feet off of a public road.  Printing out the map, I went to the area.  There was a home nearby, and I told the homeowner that a high altitude balloon had come down in the woods behind his house.  It was getting dark, so it was too late to look for it that afternoon.

Amateur radio is a funny thing.  There are so many areas of interest within the service.  And there are so many areas where each of us can be of help to each other and to the community at large.  While I knew that one use of APRS was to track balloons on their high altitude flight, I never thought I would ever get involved in any kind of balloon chase or retrieval.  However, on Sunday night, when I saw the pictures on the web of the VE3LCA-11 balloon launch the day before, and all the nice, enthusiastic Canadian youngsters participating, I knew I had to do my best to get the payload back to Canada from where it came.   And it confirmed to me that our addition of an APRS digi-peater to our Mount Ascutney repeater site was a sound decision.

Monday morning, I transcribed the landing point latitude and longitude into my hand held GPS, and created a waypoint.  I got hold of fellow CVFMA member, 89 year young John, W1AKV, along with his dog, Moses.  We set forth to look for what had come down.  I was concerned that we would have to cross a stream, which in the area ran in a ravine.  When we got back into the woods, we found the area crossed by a snowmobile trail, which conveniently forded the steam by a bridge.  Following the GPS waypoint I had created and looking up into the trees, I spotted a small orange parachute canopy with a Styrofoam box dangling below it.  It was VE3LCA-11.  Success!!

The only problem was, it was up about 65 feet in the uppermost small branches of a sugar maple.   There was no way we were going to retrieve it ourselves short of cutting the tree down.  And the tree trunk was about 15" in diameter.  And I had no idea who owned the tree.  I could see the Rutland Herald headline, "Andover Radio Ham and Justice of the Peace, Raymond Makul, arrested for unauthorized removal of tree".

John, Moses and I went back to the road.  By happenstance, we were intercepted by some fellows working on a tree crew.  They had learned about the chute in the tree.  One, a tree climber, was willing to retrieve it.  However, the negotiation went all wrong with him.  I will skip the messy and infuriating details.  However, I will say that I rarely blow my stack, but in dealing with this guy, he managed to reach my boiling point.

In any event, I was able to locate another, more personable, professional tree climber here in Andover.  On Wednesday Nov 11 the payload was successfully retrieved.  The tree climber's reaction was that it was the strangest assignment he has ever had as a tree climber.

The VE3LCA-11 payload consisted of the Styrofoam box, which contained a digital camera, a temperature probe, the necessary GPS board and transmitter, and batteries to operate the electronics and camera.   Various stiff wires emerged that served as the antennas.   I did not open the box, preferring to return it to Barrie intact.

While Barrie said I could mail the box back to him in Ontario, I had visions of an overenthusiastic Homeland Security officer destroying it as a suspected radio controlled bomb, and coming by to my QTH with a firm offer of a one way trip to Guantanamo.  So instead of mailing it across national borders, I suggested to Barrie that we meet somewhere around half way between us for a handoff.   That handoff occurred on Wednesday, November 18 in Tupper Lake, New York, over brunch.  It was a most enjoyable meeting of the launchers with the payload finder.

VE3LCA-11 reached an altitude of over 110,000 feet before the balloon burst, and its payload drifted back to earth on its parachute.  It burst approximately over Lake George, New York, and drifted into Vermont and landing here in Andover.

Barrie has invited us to participate in a future balloon launch in Ontario, and I have invited Barrie down to a future CVFMA meeting for a talk on amateur radio at the edge of the ionosphere.  

And how fitting that a balloon launched from Canada, whose symbol is the Maple Leaf, would come down in the arms of a Vermont sugar maple tree.  

As Rosanne Rosannadanna used to say, "Its always something!!".