{"id":4657,"date":"2017-12-25T02:10:24","date_gmt":"2017-12-25T01:10:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/?p=4657"},"modified":"2018-11-25T21:23:43","modified_gmt":"2018-11-25T20:23:43","slug":"2017-12-14-xmas-probe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/?p=4657","title":{"rendered":"2017-12-24: The Xmas Probe"},"content":{"rendered":"

The prediction put the landing location near Crailsheim. As I would be on my way to my parents’ place anyways and pass by Crailsheim, why not arranging the timing to be at the right place at the right time?<\/p>\n

I already picked up the probe when leaving Stuttgart. Near Autobahn Intersection Weinsburg, the signal became so strong, that the decoder could disassemble a couple of packages with the antenna lying on the dashboard (i.e. without directing\u00a0 the antenna into the direction of the probe).<\/p>\n

Eventually, the balloon would burst. Near Kochertalbr\u00fccke, I found a resting area, where I tracked the probe until landing. I suddenly noticed that the power converter no longer produced electricity which would make the computer and therewith the reception and subsequent decoding of probe telemetry stop pretty soon. Fiddling around the the converter, I realized that the fuse of the socket must have blown. I connected the converter to the socket of the cigarette lighter, and from the high chirping noise of the converter I could hear that I was back in business.<\/p>\n

I received the last package:<\/p>\n

[ 8463] (M3853109) (2017-12-24) So 13:09:41.620 lat: 49.27513 lon: 9.66126 alt: 523.3 (d:14.8) vH: 5.2 D: 74.5\u00b0 vV: -4.5 DOP[2,6,9,23,5,7,30,16,29,13] 1.7<\/p>\n

So the probe was near K\u00fcnzelsau. I switch from map mode to satellite mode, and I realized that it would be difficult to get the probe — the GPS coordinates indicated that the probe would most likely have landed in the forest.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Probe descending towards landing site<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
When I received the last telemetry the probe was over a forest near Kunzelsau<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

I drove to K\u00fcnzelsau and received the probe when I turned into the street between school and forest in the picture above. I parked, got on my boots, took the directional antenna and the radio, and started looking. About 15 minutes later, I had located the probe. The probe dangled from a tree about 5 meters above the ground. Using a long branch, I tried to tear it down to no avail. Without appropriate tools (like a quadrocopter to attach a hook with a rope or a chain saw to cut the tree :-)), and no good ideas, I left and went to my parents’ place to celebrate Christmas.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
The Probe hanging suspended from a Tree about 5 m above the Ground<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Before I left, I arranged some marks on the ground and took fotos to be able to trace back to the site\u00a0 — just in case I\u00a0 developped an idea on how to recover the probe with reasonable effort.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
I left some marks (arrow from branches in the foreground, and a stick in the ground below the probe in the background) to be able to find back to the landing site — just in case.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a02017-12-26: The Recovery<\/h1>\n

Going back to Stuttgart, I would pass by K\u00fcnzelsau again. As the probe was hanging high above the ground in the forest, it was unlikely that somebody would have recovered in the meanwhile. In the basement of my parents place, I found some wooden rods and a hook which I assembled to an expendable bar\u00a0 of 3,90 meters length. Being 1,95 m and being able to reach out about another 40 cm, I would be able to catch the probe up to a height of about 6,20 meters. Checking the images I had taken, I estimated that the probe was hanging not 5 meters but 6 meters meters above the ground. As there are always 10 cm missing, I brought another rod and some wire to extend the bar — just in case \ud83d\ude42 My mother found the idea of\u00a0 the little trip so appealing that she spontaneously decided to come along.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
On the way to the landing zone in K\u00fcnzelsau. In the sky ahead there were dramatically looking and heavy rain clouds hanging.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
My mother holding the expendable rod on the way to the landing site of the probe<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Having arrived I tried to reach out to the probe. Of course, there were 10 cm missing, so extended the bar with another wooden rod and fastened it with wire. The hook hitched in, and I pulled down the probe until the rope ripped. There it was — we finally recovered it.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
My mother holding the expendable bar\u00a0 with the hook and happily presenting the recovered probe.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Myself holding the expendable bar with the hook and the recovered probe — mission accomplished…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

With the probe recovered, I went to Crailsheim to drop my mother at the train station, and went on into the opposite direction to Stuttgart to celebrate Christmas with Felix and Gisela a second time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The prediction put the landing location near Crailsheim. As I would be on my way to my parents’ place anyways and pass by Crailsheim, why not arranging the timing to be at the right place at the right time? I already picked up the probe when leaving Stuttgart. Near Autobahn Intersection Weinsburg, the signal became … Continue reading 2017-12-24: The Xmas Probe<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4657"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4657"}],"version-history":[{"count":33,"href":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4657\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4700,"href":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4657\/revisions\/4700"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gloetzner.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}