In Maryland, a balloon from JLENS (Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System) broke loose from its tether. The balloon eventually descended to the ground, but its dragging cable caused an electrical outage affecting 30,000 or 35,000 people. The Secretary of Defense promised to catch the balloon and fly it again.
Coverage can be found from a multitude of sources:
The Energy Education Council offers safety tips for helium balloons.
We previously covered JLENS in September with: JLENS Balloons Still Not Warning US of Cruise Missiles which has more background on the system.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 30 2015, @08:59AM
More likely the argument will be made for more of them to be deployed. Just in case another one of them gets disabled/breaks loose, with more in the sky there will not be any loss of "protection".
Side note: Did something happen to the Soylent user database? When I tried to log in to post I kept getting a message that my password was wrong. But when I put in my handle to recover my password the system said there was no account with that handle.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Friday October 30 2015, @02:17PM
Nope, i can still access your account just fine.
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