An electronic radiosonde device has fallen from the heavens onto a paddock at a Cobargo farm, complete with the shredded remains of what appears to be a weather balloon.
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Luckily it missed any cows in the paddock, but the bovines seemed to have investigated the device themselves, becoming temporarily tangled and snapping some of the fine string attached.
Property owner Vicky Hoyer picked up the device on Sunday at Atherton Farm about 2km south of Cobargo, after her neighbour alerted to the strange contraption.
Ms Hoyer said she would just like to know where the device had come from and what it was being used for before it landed in her paddock.
“I wouldn’t like to be bonked on the head by one,” she said, estimating the device to weigh around half a kilogram including the shredded balloon and string.
Using the barcode on the side of the device, she was able to track down the manufacturer of the device as German company GRAW Radiosondes and the website lists it as the DFM-09 model.
The Narooma News contacted the company via email and GRAW sales manager Claudia Elter wrote back that these radiosondes are sent up into the atmosphere under a balloon for weather forecasting.
“As radiosondes are consumables which can only be used once, they are of no more commercial value. Therefore you can either keep this radiosonde or put in the trash,” she wrote.
The Bureau of Meteorology has also been contacted to see if they can identify the device and say where it was launched from.
In the meantime, Ms Hoyer has kept the device to add to her collection of memorabilia from the farm.
There are numerous videos on the internet where people have sent items to the edge of space using weather balloons, making for fascinating viewing.