BARREL 2N: Balloon Housekeeping Voltage, Temperature, Current, and Status Data

Over 50 stratospheric balloon flights were launched across four campaigns from 2013 to 2016. The BARREL mission, a NASA Living with a Star Mission of Opportunity, collected housekeeping voltage, temperature, current, and payload status values every 40 seconds. Observations were made near Antarctic and Arctic circles at stratospheric altitudes around 30 km to study electron precipitation from Earth's radiation belts.

Use Cases

• Monitoring payload health and environmental conditions based on housekeeping voltage, temperature, and current data
• Studying temporal variations in electron precipitation events based on coordinated balloon and Van Allen Probes measurements
• Characterizing spatial scales of relativistic electron precipitation based on balloon array observations across magnetic local time
• Correlating balloon-borne X-ray spectrometer data with ground-based radar measurements like EISCAT
• Analyzing ULF-timescale magnetic field variations based on DC magnetometer readings

Strengths

• Data collected from over 50 balloon flights across four campaigns spanning 2013 to 2016
• Observations coordinated with the Van Allen Probes mission and other ground and space-based instruments
• Housekeeping data recorded at a consistent 40-second interval

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download
• The analog sensor data are based on a nominal layout; some payloads may have small differences not reflected

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Data collected by BARREL balloon payloads carrying X-ray spectrometers and DC magnetometers.

Time Range

Campaigns conducted in 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 03:45:08.826367; freshness should be verified

Geography

Launches from Halley Bay (Antarctica), SANAE IV base (Antarctica), and Esrange Space Center (Kiruna, Sweden). Observations near Antarctic and Arctic circles.