“Authorities said Friday that a high-tech, high-altitude balloon belonging to Google became entangled in power lines when it fell to Earth near a mint field about 2 miles south of Harrah early Thursday,” Kate Prengaman reports for Yakima Herald-Republic.
“It knocked out power to a small number of homes in the immediate area of Harrah and Fort roads when it crashed about 1 a.m., according to Bob Gravely, a spokesman for Pacific Power,” Prengaman reports. “An employee with the utility responded to the area and found ‘what appeared to be a weather balloon with blinking lights entangled in the power lines off Harrah Road,’ Gravely said.”
“On Thursday, the Federal Aviation Administration told the Yakima Herald-Republic that Google had notified the agency that its device was descending Wednesday night, so that it could ensure that all aircraft stayed safely out of its path,” Prengaman reports. “The company is developing solar-powered balloons that can be used to broadcast a wireless Internet signal in regions that lack traditional access. Known as Project Loon, the balloons are designed to float high in the atmosphere, above commercial air space.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Symbolic.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Jeff L.” for the heads up.]
Heh. Let’s hope this doesn’t happen with their satellite initiative… if it even gets off the ground, that is. :))
Created by loons, for loons.
Watch Google power their satellite with nuke energy, oops wrong orbit, CRASH!, ‘golly folks, sorry for the fall out.’ 😉
They were shooting for the Moscone Center, and missed. And missed. And…
Our Lady of Perpetual Beta strikes again.
Beta crash is to be expected.
Just wait until their driverless cars ‘hit the road.’
Literally.
Ha!! Now it turns out a stupid balloon has priority over aircraft, and it must stay out of a ballon’s path, whatever that path is. As if aircraft had nothing else to watch out for.
“the Federal Aviation Administration told the Yakima Herald-Republic that Google had notified the agency that its device was descending Wednesday night, so that it could ensure that all aircraft stayed safely out of its path,”
Makes me laugh, a balloon that is spreading radiation via wifi has higher priority over planes with passengers in.
Go Falcon… Go!
You had better be careful with that reference. It’s a priceless antique.
Hmmmm, “Project Loon.” Has an appropriate ring to it i think…
I’d hate to see what their self-driving cars are like.
Well, at least they won’t fall out of the sky.
Famous last words?
Just too easy. “Crazy as a Loon” once again. Who came up with “Project Loon”.
Even by their own standards, it’s pretty bad.
“If you have a power line you don’t want Google to take out, maybe you shouldn’t be stringing it up in the first place.”
Where’s all the gaggle trolls? Botvine or cup of Joe, where are you??
Pix or it didn’t happen.
So this is the kind of crap that the Tech Writers like Mossberg wants Apple to do to stay relevant? Mossberg has fallen to the same stupid thinking as the rest of the Pundits.
There was a time, during the journalistic rush to kill Apple circa 1997, that Mossberg was foolishly a Mac hater. He can be a bit of a, ahem, cow at times. As goes the herd, so goes…
So instead if Baaaaaaa he is now a Moooooo! lol 😜
We’re working our way through the ruminants.
This is udder lunacy
If that balloon had Apple printed on it, this would be front page news across the world and there would be a Congressional inquiry.
Loon Balloon Swoons!
Quick, send that headline to The Register!
Or: Loon Balloon Swoons … Too Soon!
In Europe somebody requested Google to remove a link to this information. I just don’t know who was asking for it…
Google’s Project Loon, and their other big project with communications satellites (call it Project Skynet), were both supposed to boost revenues by bringing internet access to remote parts of the world. Facebook has a similar dream.
What I don’t get is how this generates revenue for them. Do nomads and remote villagers even have any disposable income to spend clicking on internet ads? And what would the ads show—camel grooming, 50% off?
Lol exactly right.
There is no sense to holes strategy (if they have one at all).
Google is just throwing stuff out there, wheras apple is generating billions because it has a strategy.
Give it 10yrs and google will be dead unless they start learning some business basics.
Connect to our wifi or no electricity for you!!
Next is the water, we mean it!
Unsurprised google hasn’t tried to register the word ‘water’ as a trademark.
Solar powered balloon descends onto power lines at 1 am.
Ironic.
I think it was short of juice……..
Maybe it got lost because it was using google maps 🙂
Google’s response: “You ain’t seen anything yet. Wait until we have a fleet of self driving cars on the freeways… “.
That’s the day I give up driving. There’s too many idiots who drive on the road – imagine how many idiot robots there are going to be!
The driverless car is a pipe dream and a major catastrophe just waiting to happen.
Governments will ban them as soon as the 1st person dies in a crash with one.
No need to be mean. We certainly do need more choices when it comes to internet access.
No we don’t.
MDN: ‘Symbolic’
*SNAP*
First the Loon balloon. Then the GOOG balloon. But when the GOOG bubble bursts, it’s going take out a lot more than few house’s power. Tick-Tick-Tick.
OH THE HUMANITY!
Was the loony tunes balloon running on Android? The reason for the fail was because blimpy got malware and the battery only lasted 15 minutes. Next, car without steering wheel drives off cliff.