An Accurate Wind Retrieval Method Based on Observing Hydrogen Balloons with Multi-Theodolite Measurements

Abstract

Abstract The hydrogen balloon is widely used for wind sensing by tracking it with optical theodolites. The traditional theodolite observation (single- and double-theodolite) methods assume that the balloon is a perfect tracer of the background wind and it rises with a constant speed during the whole observation period, but these assumptions may not hold well in complex wind circumstances. In this paper, an accurate wind field retrieval method based on multi-theodolite measurement is proposed. The extended Kalman filter algorithm is used to filter the angle data observed by the theodolites in order to accurately estimate the trajectory of the balloon, and the motion equation is used to correct the velocity difference between the background wind and the balloon. As a result, not only the horizontal velocity but also the vertical velocity can be accurately retrieved by this method. Numerical simulation and field experiments show that the multi-theodolite observation method excels the traditional single-theodolite method, and the velocity errors can be reduced by even more than 40% in comparison with the single-theodolite method for complex wind cases. Significanace Statement In the meteorological community, hydrogen balloon tracking is a widely used wind retrieval method, but the accuracy is limited, especially under complex wind conditions. In this paper, a new method based on tracking the hydrogen balloon with multi-theodolite is proposed, which uses the extended Kalman filter and the motion equation to get an accurate estimation of the balloon’s velocity and fix the inertia effect of balloon, respectively. Simulation and field experiment show that the new method can reduce the velocity error by more than 40% compared with the traditional method.