Seven Scientific Balloons to Fly From New Mexico for NASA Campaign

A NASA Scientific Balloon Program annual campaign is taking flight at the agency’s balloon launch facility in Fort Sumner, New Mexico. Seven balloon flights carrying scientific experiments and technology demonstrations are scheduled to launch starting in mid-August.

To follow the missions in the 2025 Fort Sumner campaign, visit NASA’s Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility website for real-time updates of balloons’ altitudes and locations during flight. The flights will test and verify system designs for balloon platforms and conduct science investigations, including a mission to study dust and debris around nearby stars with the possibility of detecting bright, gas giant planets outside our solar system.

Zero-pressure balloons, used in this campaign, are in thermal equilibrium with their surroundings as they fly. They maintain a zero-pressure differential with ducts that allow gas to escape to prevent an increase in pressure from inside the balloons as they rise above Earth’s surface. This zero-pressure design makes the balloons very robust and well-suited for short, domestic flights, such as those in this campaign.

NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia manages the agency’s scientific balloon flight program. Peraton, which operates NASA’s Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility in Palestine, Texas, provides mission planning, engineering services, and field operations for NASA’s Scientific Balloon Program. NASA’s balloons are fabricated by Aerostar. The NASA Scientific Balloon Program is funded by the Science Mission Directorate’s Astrophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington.