Can anyone identify this UAP in Weaverville, CA?

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In summary, a business client in Weaverville, CA noticed a strange object in the sky and filmed it for over an hour. The object was a high altitude balloon, which was drifting in the light winds above the jet streams.
  • #1
Devin-M
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I was in Weaverville, CA on 6/12/22 at about 12:17pm when my business client noticed a strange object in the sky. I filmed it several times over the course of about the next hour. Video initially shoot looking towards NNW.









Location, Pointing Direction & Stellar background in direction of object at the time:

IMG_6916.PNG


IMG_6912.PNG
 
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  • #2
It's not moving very fast, so my first guess would be a weather balloon.
 
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  • #3
Weather balloon or High Altitude Balloon.
Maybe HBAL628, which has been flying at about 55,000 ft for some time in that region. It began in Texas, early May, and is now near Twin Falls in Idaho.
https://flightaware.com/live/
Set the altitude filter to above 45kft and it will be easy to find.

Weekly Balloon News #19. June 7th said:
"Meanwhile, the other Thunderhead Aerostar in flight, mission HBAL628 continues operating after more than a month aloft. It was launched from Hurley (SD) on May 5, 2023, and initially moved across the Nebraska/Texas border. Last week, the balloon moved farther west and started to hover between New Mexico and Colorado with the same in-and-out pattern between both states we had seen before."
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  • #4
Alien spaceship obviously. :alien:
 
  • #5
Free access to FlightRadar24 shows that HBAL628 left Northern California about a week ago, flying just south of the Oregon border. Identification is much easier if you log in while observing the flight or the object.
https://www.flightradar24.com/HBAL628/306cca05
Playback of the flight shows it visited Weaverville on Mon, 12 Jun 2023 at about 15:05 UTC. I would call that a positive ID without converting timezones.

HBAL628_WeavervilleCA.jpg


Aircraft tracking apps like FlightAware and FlightRadar24 now do quite well, but have limited functionality and get confused by flights that just keep on going and refuse to land after a few days.
 
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  • #6
A few hours later at 1842 UTC, HBAL628 drifted north again, this time right over the centre of Weaverville. That fits the video record better.

HBAL628_Weaverville.jpg
 
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  • #7
Interestingly, according to: https://flightaware.com/live/ if you filter for minimum altitude 48000 ft it's literally the only object above that altitude in the entire country.
 
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  • #8
berkeman said:
It's not moving very fast, so my first guess would be a weather balloon.
It looks above the clouds (or, at least, as high).

Didn't know weather balloons could get that high (if they can).
 
  • #9
balloon.jpg
 
  • #11
Devin-M said:
According to this page, the project was "supposedly" shut down by Google in 2021...
Yes, the Alphabet mobile phone service was shut down when the Starlink satellite service came online. There are still civil, academic, scientific and military applications for the balloons being used and developed.

Sign up with Stratocat to get the world-wide high altitude balloon activity reports in your email. Keep a FlightAware filter open for HBAL flights that may enter your region. You will see corporate business jets up to 50k ft, and the NASA U2 at 60k ft.

The high altitude balloons drift in the light winds above the jet streams. They navigate by rising or falling between 55k ft and 65k ft. Navigation to station, then position-holding, has been done by AI software. Live maps of the upper-winds they occupy are found here. https://earth.nullschool.net/#curre...inkel3=-110.61,43.11,2150/loc=-106.418,31.361

Some of us have been watching the HBALxxx flights, along with U2 spy planes, and test flights of drones high above Area 51.

HBALxxx were launched from Raven Industries near Baltic SD, but now are launched from Hurley SD. Both those launch sites are on the bore-line from the old "Russian Woodpecker", Over-Horizon-Radar at Chernobyl, Ukraine. That looked out over Stockholm in Sweden, then Greenland, Canada, and on to Roswell NM. That may just be a coincidence.
 
  • #12
Looks baloney to me.
 
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