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A balloon startup out of Stanford now makes sharper weather forecasts than the European supercomputers that have ruled the field for decades, according to TechCrunch. WindBorne’s newly released WeatherMesh-6 is more accurate than the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) and refreshes its predictions hourly, four times faster than the every-six-hours pace of traditional models.
WindBorne’s edge comes from its roughly 400 balloons launched from 15 sites feeding live readings straight into the model, loosening its old reliance on ECMWF’s data. But it hasn’t all been blue skies. Last fall, a WindBorne balloon hit a United Airlines Boeing 737 Max over Utah, cracking the windshield and injuring a pilot. The company now uses live flight-tracking to steer its balloons clear of passing planes.
Even with their success, the company is holding off on building a slick app, betting people will soon get forecasts through AI assistants instead. The strategy is that owning the data matters more than owning the screen people tap on.