Comments by "SeanBZA" (@SeanBZA) on "Airbus A319 hits pyrotechnic balloon! Breaking news" video.

Much easier to just take off after the drag, and dump the hook over the ocean......
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@I_am_Phil_Lee Just have to accelerate to close to Mach 1 and apply speed brakes and pull back slightly so the hook allows the loop to slide forward, and the rising airframe misses the loop.
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@I_am_Phil_Lee Trust me they can definitely do that.
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Legit balloons yes, but party ones the only radar reflector is the actual aluminised mylar of the envelope and the trailers, which most aircraft radar will show as either a dense cloud or as a flock of birds, if it shows up at all, as the scattering will not give a definite echo. The balloon looks a lot like a chaff flare just after release, before it has spread out, to a radar set.
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@Rob2 Easy enough to incorporate as part of the tracking package, just use foil strips a half wavelength long at the RADAR frequency, stuck to the box, or make the box itself from metallised paper which they are made from. Reflector, thermal insulation all in one material.
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@Rob2 No you cannot, as the X shape forms a corner reflector, but the quarter wave strips resonate with the incident pulse and emit much more strongly a return signal than a random flat surface. Just like with the first US made balloon surveillance cameras they floated across the USSR, where the one aluminium stiffener rod in the structure was resonant at the USSR radar frequency, making the otherwise nearly radar invisible balloon show up clearly on the USSR early warning radar sets. The units otherwise were almost entirely made from either polymer or were coated with absorbent foam material.
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Yes, they are launched typically where they will not go, with the common prevailing winds, into flight paths, and also ascend very rapidly, so only are a danger during the 5 minutes or so it takes them to ascend past 40k feet, and again for the 5 minutes or so they take to go from 40k feet to impact on the way down, after the balloon has burst at around 120k feet. Also launched in conjunction with local ATC, so no flights will be in the projected flight path.
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