A National Weather Service Balloon Landed Somewhere In Rockford

No word yet if there is a falcon inside. 

According to WREX the Quad Cities National Weather Service launched a balloon from their headquarters that has landed somewhere in Rockford and is looking for help in retrieving it.

The boundary they think it is in is bordered by State and Newberg to the north and south and Perryville and Mulford as the east and west boundries.

It is apparently legal and kind of a hobby for people to track and collect them when they eventually fall out of the sky. This guy has a pretty good video showing you how to do it if that is something that interests you.

Of course, the entire reason for this post is to talk about the famous balloon boy incident of <checks the internet> 2009!

This video is a little long but does an excellent job of recapping what happened.

There are a few moments in history that would have been absolutely epic in the current climate of social media. I personally kind of despise social media but it makes huge live events so much more compelling.

Imagine if we all had smartphones when Ron Artest went into the stands to fight a fan. The videos would have been insane and Twitter would have given us so much more insight into the calamity.

Some other events that would have been electric:

• The OJ car chase
• Miracle on Ice
• JFK assisination
• When H.W. vomited in Japan
• The Seinfeld finale

But bubble boy would have been one of the best. You could have had skeptics right off the bat saying it was fake and then gloating when they were busted on live TV. Vigils would have been organized all over the country. It would have been chaos.

Anyway. If you find the weather balloon here in Rockford, just follow the directions on the white box to return it to the National Weather Service.