Windy Balloon Launch on Tuesday, July 17th

Windy Balloon Launch: 7/17/18

On Tuesday, July 17th decaying thunderstorms to the northwest of Grand Junction produced gusty outflow winds across the Grand Valley. The Grand Junction Regional Airport measured a peak wind gust of 70 mph at 4:10 PM MDT! Those strong winds persisted over the next hour and, by the time we sent up our weather balloon at 5:00 PM gusts were up to 58 MPH. Weather balloons are launched at various locations all across the world twice a day, every day, under a wide variety of conditions. We won't launch if there's lightning nearby but otherwise it's fair game! Check out the video of the balloon launch below!

Meteorologist Jimmy Fowler launches the evening weather balloon in 58 MPH winds