Europe resurrects balloons to take platforms to the stratosphere

Construction of an LTA Research airship at a San Francisco plant.LTA RESEARCH

Technology does not always look forward to advance.

Sometimes it is necessary to review the past to recover ideas that failed because it was not their time.

airship disaster

, which caught fire over New Jersey (USA) and killed 36 people.

This accident relegated the balloons to recreational or observation uses with small-sized technologies.

The European Commission and six defense ministries believe that it is time to recover these aircraft and have allocated 63.5 million euros to the EuroHAPS project (

), which is already developing stratospheric demonstrators (prototypes to test all the systems of the future device) that give rise to dirigible, ecological and recoverable balloons to improve communication capabilities and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) missions. English).

Spain will be the base for two of the models whose first flights are scheduled in a year.

Stratospheric balloons are large unmanned aircraft that use a constant volume of high-pressure helium and are capable of reaching the second main layer of Earth's atmosphere, from where scientific, communication, and security and defense work can be carried out.

This zone of space, located at an altitude of about 20 kilometers, is an underutilized environment, despite being optimal for long-duration missions with recoverable devices and for telecommunications links.

NASA and a dozen companies have already begun to develop them and the EU does not want to be left behind, which is why it has awarded three models whose manufacture, deployment and operation it has contracted with Thales Alenia Space, which has brought together some thirty entities from 11 countries.

Recreation of the 'Stratobus' developed by Thales Alenia Space.TAS

One of them is the

, an airship that will start the tests from a stratoport that is being built in Fuerteventura (Spain).

It is a helium stratospheric balloon that will operate at an altitude of between 18 and 20 kilometers propelled by electricity generated from 1,000 square meters of solar panels.

The final model will be 140 meters long (double that of the first prototype), four engines with a power of 5 kilowatts and 250 kilograms of payload capacity.

The Italian Center for Aerospace Research (CIRA for its acronym in Italian) has developed and patented the

or tactical HAPS, a hybrid airship capable of sustaining itself by self-buoyancy and by the aerodynamic forces generated by the shape of its wings, such as an inflatable plane

The Autonomous Stratospheric

System (ASBS) has been developed by the German entities ESG and TAO and involves the development of three controllable altitude helium aircraft.

His model is more similar to conventional hot air balloons, but with a design that allows control of the trajectory.

The three prototypes are already being developed in parallel because each one provides its own characteristics of useful life, load capacity and operability with which to respond to the different uses, ranging from observation by means of laser radars (lidar), even in environments covered by vegetation , high-speed telecommunications to security missions.

In this sense, six defense ministries support the initiative.

The crisis of the Chinese balloons over North American territory has made these devices topical.

But José Antonio Álvarez de Arcaya, director of Strategy at Thales Alenia Space, affirms that the work of the European consortium is much older.

"We have been working on the project for many years, since 2016, but the propaganda has been good for us," he jokes.

More information

Spying from the sky: this is how the technology of stratospheric balloons works

“We are focused on developing a green, autonomous aircraft that, unlike the Chinese balloon, has handling capacity: it can follow the trajectories we want or stay put in a certain position for a year in the stratosphere.

These HAPS platforms are pseudo-satellites, that is, they are halfway between a drone and a satellite”, he explains.

The operational advantage of stratospheric balloons is that they can remain over a given point constantly and the ability to capture images with simpler optics makes them especially useful for surveillance and object tracking or for deploying high-capacity telecommunications bands in a location. specified during a specified time.

“You can do anything you can think of,” Álvarez points out.

In addition, operating costs are infinitely lower than with rocket systems and they are equipped with high-tech flexible solar cells that power electric motors to correct position.

The balloon, with its cargo, can be brought back to Earth for maintenance and be put back into operation.

“A lot can be done with 100 days of ballooning.

It is like an experiment with satellites at a tenth of the cost”, highlights

Giovanni Fazio, from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, in

Debbie Fairbrother, chief of NASA's Balloon Program Office, shares this view: "Superpressure balloon technology is a real game changer for conducting cutting-edge science at the edge of space at a fraction of the cost." to fly into space.

Work planned this year includes a mission to study galaxy clusters and another to analyze high-energy particles from beyond our galaxy."

Álvarez Arcaya defends that, above all, they are safe: “It is one of the most important issues.

The first prototype will demonstrate the effectiveness of all the systems in the takeoff, trajectory control and landing phases.

And also the security devices, including the self-destruct one.

When we lower it to a nearby level, always in the sea, we are going to activate the self-destruct device, which is a key aspect if control is lost at any time and it is necessary to bring it down in a safe area”.

Fuerteventura will become the launch base for two of the models (

and ASBS), while Sardinia will be for the other prototype.

If all the tests go well, in 2025 a balloon will be launched with three contracted missions related to image taking, detection of mobile networks and observation of coasts.

None of the prototypes has been designed for cargo transport between two points or for passengers.

To carry 250 kilos, a 140-meter platform is required, so it is not very efficient for now in the heavy goods transport sector.

Lighter Than Air (LTA) Research develops electric airships that it hopes to be able to operate in 2025 in humanitarian work.

But Carl Taussig, the company's head of technology, does not rule out that the activity could be expanded.

“A blimp is somewhere in between sea cargo and air cargo,” he argues.

You can write to us at

Subscribe to continue reading

Read without limits

Keep reading

I'm already a subscriber