Balloon over Sussex?

[Synthetic]

Yesterday at 18:39 I was out in the garden taking pictures of birds when a glint caught my eye. Unfortunately I had only a short lens with me so I took a picture and ran into the house to get a long lens but when I got back it had disappeared. Much fiddling later I had this.

http://i217.photobucket.com/albums/cc222/Oggy3323/UFO1.jpg

I looks like a high performance balloon, but it was at between twenty and thirty thousand feet in an airlane South of Gatwick/Heathrow to Europe.

It was losing altitude fairly quickly and swinging around quite a bit.

Does anyone know anything about it?

[floppyjock]

Looks like a Radiosonde that collects data for the Met Office.


Weather Balloon Radiosonde Stock Photos NWS National Weather Service Key West (http://www.ultimatechase.com/chase_accounts/Weather_Balloon_Launch.htm)

Floppy

[Synthetic]

Thanks for the reply. A radiosonde was my first thought, but all immages of them I could find had single balloons. This appeared to be at least three with some sort of canopy over them and much larger.

[matspart3]

Maybe it was this...

Q) EGTT/QWLXX/IV/M/W/000/999/5047N00151W100
FROM: 09/05/30 08:43 TO: 09/05/30 23:59
E) BREAKAWAY BALLOON REPORT:
TIME SIGHTED: 0905300810
LAST KNOWN POSITION: OVERHEAD BOURNEMOUTH AIRPORT
TYPE OF BALLOON: LARGE TEDDY BEAR SHAPED
DIMENSIONS:UNKNOWN
MARKINGS:UNKNOWN
LAST KNOWN HEIGHT: FL270
WIND SPEED AT THAT LEVEL: 010 DEG 15KT
LOWER: SFC
UPPER: UNL

[Synthetic]

I don't think that was it. What I saw was all silvered and not teddy bear shaped, and I am on the outskirts of Worthing so om 010 from Bournemouth, it would have been about a hundred miles away.

[SkyHawk-N]

I believe these balloons get released by the Met Office at Pease Pottage.