» How to register your weather balloon in Germany «

To get your “stratosphere adventure” started, you need a permit for the uplift. Legally, the weather ballon is a so-called “unmanned free balloon”. In Germany the granting of the permit is up to the state in which you would like to start. Therefore, you must apply for the desired permit to the Federal Aviation Authority, and possibly with the German air traffic control. The registration takes place via e-mail, whereby a processing time between two and four calendar weeks should be expected.

In order to give you a head start, we have developed a generator that guides you step-by-step through the registration process. Furthermore, the generator provides some tips and hints*. In the end, you receive an e-mail with all the relevant information for your registration. The only thing which is up to you is to forward this e-mail to the responsible Federal Office of Civil Aviation.

Note/attention: Stratoflights wants to point out that we can’t take any responsibility if the permission will not be granted. Furthermore, we can’t take any liability for the accuracy, timeliness, and completeness of the information published on our website. In any case, you are required to check the current legal situation with the appropriate authorities before the flight.



Overview and contact details of the national aviation authorities:
https://www.stratoflights.com/en/tutorial/german-aviation-authorities/

Contact details of the German Air Traffic Control (DFS):
https://www.dfs.de/dfs_homepage/de/Services/Luftsport%20&%20Freizeit/Sonstige%20Aktivit%C3%A4ten/

* Our tool provides you with a completion assistance for your ascent approval regarding the requirements from the Federal Aviation Office and the German Air Traffic Control. Stratoflights has no connection with the authorities and takes no guarantee or liability. In any case, a direct contact with the authorities is required.

Source:
Durchführungsverordnung (EU) Nr. 923/2012 (Für "Unbemannte Freiballone" s. Anlage 2 (ab S. 54))

Intended purpose:
All displayed data here are for information purposes only and have no entitlement to be correct and complete.

Disclaimer:
This website is constantly updated and checked. Despite all care, however, information may have changed in the meantime. The accuracy, completeness and timeliness of the information published on the pages, cannot be guaranteed. Stratoflights takes no liability for the published information.
Hier steht ein Hinweis.

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Here you have to enter the exactly coordinates of your launch site (Longitude, Latitude)

To get the coordinates use Google Maps to navigate close to your launch site. A click with the right mouse button opens the context menu. Click on "What is here?". The GPS coordinates are now displayed at the bottom of the screen.

Tip: Within urban areas it can be difficult to get a permit. In general, in more rural areas it's easier to get the permission. It is important to keep a sufficient distance from airports or restricted areas.

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Please name the location where you want to launch.

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Please enter the launch date in the following form: dd/mm/yyyy

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Please just enter the time you want to launch your unmanned free balloon. If you apply for a launch period, please enter it here in your local time.

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Please enter here the applilcant details: name, address.

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What material is your unmanned free balloon made of?

Stratoflights weather balloons consist of a natural rubber-latex mixture.

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Color of unmanned free balloon and color of your parachute and payload package.

Weather balloons by Stratoflights are white, parachutes are red and our styrofoam capsules are white.

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Please enter the total length of your weather balloon plus the special cord between weather balloon and parachute, and also ass the length of the special cord between parachute and your capsule.

For example we recommend a length in total of 15 meters.

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Please find out the total weight of your full equipment like cameras, GPS Tracker, styrofoam capsule, parachute, weather balloon, ... To find out the weight in total. If you use our equipment you find detailed information in our online-shop. Please note: to get the permission it is necessary to avoid a weight of more than 4kg in total, that you are classified as light. You get no permission for medium and heavy unmanned free balloons at the moment.

You find some further information in SERA Appendix 2. "SERA Appendix 2 - Balloons".

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Please enter the weight of your weather balloon (unmanned free balloon).
For example the weather balloons by Stratoflights has the following weights:

weather balloon 800: 800g
weather balloon 1600: 1.600g
weather balloon 2000: 2.000g
weather balloon 3000: 3.000g

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To determine the smallest surface area, multiply the length (in cm) of the smallest surface area by the width (in cm) of the smallest surface area of your probe, for example, the smallest surface area of Stratoflights Polystyrene Probe is 22 cm x 18 cm = 396 cm².

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Please use the legal text of SERA to place your unmanned free balloon to the correct class.

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Please use the helium calculator of Stratoflights to calculate the ascend and descend speed and also the maximum altitude and the amount of helium/ balloon gas do you need.

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Descend speed depends on chosen parachute and mass of payload. In average the descend speed is 4-6 meters per second with our products.

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To maximum altitide depends on chosen weather balloon, payload and the amount of helium/ balloon gas. With our helium calculator you can calculate differenz options for your flight.

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Also the flight duration depends on the total mass, the amount of gas and the used weather balloon. The average stratosphere flight takes about 2.5 - 3.5 hours. Our helium calculator also provides further information.

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To get a permission you need a parachute for a safe landing. The parachute will be installed in your overall system as follows: From the weather balloon a special cord leads to the parachute and is attached to the top end. At the lower end of the parachute another piece of special cord leads to your probe. Immediately after the weather balloon plops due to the increasing atmospheric pressure, the parachute opens automatically and your probe comes back to earth softly and safely.

You can find special parachutes for your mission here!

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To be classified as light, your cord must have a tensile strength of max 230N. Our special cord in the shop meets this requirement and is just under 230N.

Für weitere Details, s. Gesetzestext "SERA - Anlage2-Ballone"

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The authorities need a description of your payload packaging:
for example the polystyrene probe of the weather balloon kit contains a camera, batterypack, GPS tracker and a datalogger to measure datas frome the Stratosphere.

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Possible reasons for launching an unmanned free balloon:
  • Earth observation
  • observation of cloud formations
  • experiments in the stratosphere for school projects
  • recording of measured data with the Datalogger and subsequent analysis


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You should use helium or balloon gas to fill your weather balloon. Further information about Helium/ Balloon gas or How to fill a weather balloon you find on our Tutorial.

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The weather balloon flies in average about 80 kilometres as the crow flies. The flight distance depends not only on the amount of gas in the balloon but also on the wind speed. On stormy days, the weather balloon can fly more than 130 kilometres as the crow flies, or it can fly a "loop" and land only a few kilometres away. If you take off near another stat, you can include in the description that the route is predicted with the help of the flight path predicting tool of Stratoflights to get a forecast and avoid crossing other states, if necessary, the take-off is postponed to another date so that the weather balloon flies inland.

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Please make sure that your payload packaging is safe and that your parachute will work. Our polystyrene probe and our parachutes are made for flights to the edge of space and most authorities know our products.

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We only sell high quality and relialbe products. All products are used by ower own for flights to the stratosphere. If you place your trust in us, please use the GPS Tracker TK102-2 or the SPOT Trace. If you use an alternative GPS tracker, please add the corresponding designation here.

ATTENTION: many TK102-2 GPS trackers are available for many times less on the Internet! However, these are usually Chinese counterfeits of the original, which do not work reliably!

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How many polystyrene probes do you send into the stratosphere? (Number of payload packages)

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