Photo

Up, Up, and Away

Meet the obsessive hunters chasing weather balloons all over Europe.
Image may contain Balloon and Ball
  • VINCENT LEVRAT
    01
    When Roland—or “F5ZV,” as he’s known on ham radio—left his job in Belfort, France a decade ago, he devoted his newfound leisure to a far more peculiar hobby: hunting radiosondes, data-collecting plastic boxes that meteorologists send into the sky on weather balloons.
  • Image may contain Electrical Device and Antenna
    VINCENT LEVRAT
    02
    Roland began using a radio receiver and antenna to track them to the rooftops, parking lots, and random cow pastures where they land. "He was completely obsessed," says Swiss photographer Vincent Levrat, who documented the chase. "He would wake up at night just to hunt."
  • This image may contain Machine and Adapter
    VINCENT LEVRAT
    03
    Levrat lives in the Swiss city of Lausanne, just 45 minutes away from an aerological survey station in Payerne that launches balloons twice a day. (Pictured is test equipment for checking probes before flight.)
  • VINCENT LEVRAT
    04
    Roland, here wandering the Chasseral in Switzerland trying to get a signal, estimates that there are hundreds of other radiosonde hunters across Europe who monitor launch schedules for weather station balloons.
  • VINCENT LEVRAT
    05
    An antenna and radio receiver tuned to the probe's frequency lets them listen to its blips and beeps, which they decode with the computer program SondeMonitor.
  • This image may contain Balloon Ball Human and Person
    VINCENT LEVRAT
    06
    An employee at the Payerne aerological station holds a balloon he will soon attach to a probe.
  • VINCENT LEVRAT
    07
    A radiosonde floats above Lake Neuchâtel in Switzerland. This image was captured with a GoPro on another radiosonde, tethered to the same balloon.
  • Image may contain Electrical Device
    VINCENT LEVRAT
    08
    A probe with its electronics on display.
  • VINCENT LEVRAT
    09
    Somewhere around 100,000 feet, the balloons burst, and the radiosondes parachute back to earth. Hunters use software called Balloon Track to predict the general area where a radiosonde might land.
  • VINCENT LEVRAT
    10
    Levrat’s playful photographs capture a sweeping view of the hunt—from the radiosondes to Roland, dwarfed by his spinning antenna as he roams the landscape, thoroughly enjoying his retirement.
Laura Mallonee is a writer for WIRED covering photography. ... Read More
Contributor
TopicsAMP Stories
Read More
Balloons. NASA Is Using Balloons to Study Space
These souped-up hot air balloons are the training ground for the next generation of space scientists.
The Father-Son Team Chasing America's Most Ominous Storms
Mitch Dobrowner travels the United States in search of the country's most ominous, beautiful storms.
The Supersonic Parachutes Carrying NASA's Martian Dreams
A new generation of space scientists is using high tech materials to resurrect the long-neglected supersonic parachute.
NOAA's New Satellite Is a Game Changer for Severe Weather
Assuming the 11,500-pound spacecraft makes it into geostationary orbit safely, it'll go by GOES-17.
Alphabet Closer to Using Balloons for Telecom in Puerto Rico
Alphabet wins FCC approval to deploy Project Loon balloons to restore telecom service on storm-battered island.
I Really, Really Want the 3,600-Piece Lego U.S.S. Enterprise
This $400 set comes with minifigures of the complete Next Gen crew, including Picard, Riker, and Wesley Crusher’s portable tractor beam.
In Orbit You Have to Slow Down to Speed Up
Driving a spacecraft around a planet isn’t anything like driving on a planet. A physicist explains orbital navigation.
How Do Metal Detectors Work?
What sneaky invisible forces enable these instruments to locate buried treasure?
Hurricane Melissa Has Meteorologists Terrified
The storm, which is set to make landfall in Jamaica on Tuesday, has stunned meteorologists with its intensity and the speed at which it built.
Physicists Create a Thermometer for Measuring ‘Quantumness’
“Anomalous” heat flow, which at first appears to violate the second law of thermodynamics, gives physicists a way to detect quantum entanglement without destroying it.
How Genes Have Harnessed Physics to Grow Living Things
The same pulling force that causes “tears” in a glass of wine also shapes embryos. It’s another example of how genes exploit mechanical forces for growth and development.
An Invasive Disease-Carrying Mosquito Has Spread to the Rocky Mountains
The Aedes aegypti mosquito that can carry dengue, yellow fever, and Zika was thought to be too reliant on a hot and wet climate to survive in the Mountain West. But now, a population is thriving in Western Colorado.