This is a memory from about 16 years ago and is based on what I remember and reports from various sources.
Hot air balloons were a regular summer sight here at Swanton Farm. They often took off from Broome Park, which is only a couple of miles North of here. For several years we’d watched dozens of them pass over on cross channel balloon flights. The last one in 1993 ran into a problem with the weather.

The lead ‘spotter’ balloons took off in a steady NNWesterly breeze,...

The Citizen Weather Observer Program (CWOP) is based in the USA and collects weather data contributed by citizens. including Amateur radio stations and makes this data available for weather services. The weather data is sent by internet alone and internet-wireless combination to a server and then every 15 minutes, the entire data set is sent from the server to the NOAA MADIS server. The data is checked for quality and then redistributed to users to provide feedback to the data contributors so that...