Weather balloons are a weather tool that has been used by the National Weather Service since the 1930s. Click here for more ...

"Taking weather balloons offline in the heartland of the ... from instruments aboard commercial aircraft, surface observing stations, satellites, radars and buoys,” the announcements stated.

The balloons are filled with helium to be roughly five feet in diameter and released at the same time from all participating weather stations, in what the Weather Service calls its Upper Air ...

So while having a vast network of airports and other weather stations across the nation helps ... changing in the sky and that’s where weather balloons come into the equation.

Among regularly reporting weather stations, NOAA had averaged about only one outage of balloon launches a day from 2021 to 2024, according to an Associated Press analysis of launch data.

In late March, the National Weather Service announced it would be temporarily reducing the number of weather balloon launches ...

Among regularly reporting weather stations, NOAA had averaged about only one outage of balloon launches a day from 2021 to 2024, according to an Associated Press analysis of launch data.