SuperTIGER-2 2018 Flight Payload Recovery and Preliminary Instrument Assessment
Abstract
The SuperTIGER (Trans-Iron Galactic Element Recorder) experiment was launched for the second time from the Long Duration Balloon (LDB) site near McMurdo Station, Antarctica on December 20, 2018 at 1:36 AM NZDT. The balloon reached a peak altitude of ∼79,300 ft before it began to descend, and the flight had to be terminated after just over six hours aloft. The payload landed at 8:17 AM NZDT approximately 150 miles from McMurdo Station at 75.80 S and 161.68 E. Satellite imagery of the site revealed that it was in a crevasse field, but a Twin Otter reconnaissance flight showed none in the immediate vicinity. A subsequent site survey by a team flown in by helicopter with ground penetrating radar was able to flag a safe zone including helicopter landing sites. The SuperTIGER-2 payload was recovered in two days with two Bell 212 helicopters followed by one day with a Basler, which involved transferring the payload to a safe fixed wing landing site roughly two miles away in three helicopter sling loads. After return to the LDB site the instrument modules were reassembled, rewired and tested prior to their being shipped north. The instrument was found to be in overall good condition, with all testable electronics channels working, and minimal mechanical damage. SuperTIGER-2 could be refurbished to fly again as early as this next Antarctic season.
Additional Information
© 2019 owned by the author(s) under the term of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Pre-published on: 2019 July 22. This work was supported by NASA Grant #NNX15AC23G, the Peggy and Steve Fossett Foundation and the McDonnell Center for the Space Sciences. We thank the NASA Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility (CSBF), the NASA Balloon Program Office, and the NSF United States Antarctic Program for the excellent and highly professional efforts that resulted in the record long-duration balloon flight for SuperTIGER and the successful recovery efforts for SuperTIGER and SuperTIGER-2. We also wish to thank Raven Aerostar, the manufacturer of the amazing balloon-craft we rely on for our science, as well as the Antarctic Support Contract (ASC) Team. Finally, we are particularly appreciative of the efforts of Scott Battaion (NASA/CSBF) and Kaija Webster (ASC) that made the recovery of SuperTIGER-2 and planned subsequent flight possible.Attached Files
Published - ICRC2019_131.pdf
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Additional details
- Eprint ID
- 98062
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20190821-082409473
- NNX15AC23G
- NASA
- Peggy and Steve Fossett Foundation
- McDonnell Center for the Space Sciences
- Created
-
2019-08-21Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
-
2020-02-20Created from EPrint's last_modified field
- Caltech groups
- Space Radiation Laboratory
- Series Name
- Proceedings of Science
- Series Volume or Issue Number
- 358