The Balloon

[Rev. Rye]

Let’s be honest,  no balloon the size of a small car can possibly carry any substantial intelligence package.   A balloon’s carrying capacity must necessarily be less than the weight of a volume of air at the balloon’s operating altitude equal to the size of the balloon itself

A balloon the size of a small car, say 10 cubic meters, would therefore have a carrying capacity at 40k feet of 4 lbs minus the weight of balloon itself.

For what it’s worth, the original balloon, the one I call The Rover, has an estimated diameter of 200 feet. That volume would be closer to 118,613 cubic meters.