Google uses giant balloons to test Internet access - Público.pt

Hayden MacKenzie was no reaction. Answered the phone and the other end asked if anyone wanted to go on a secret project. Linked from Google. But only when a group of strangers arrived in the small community of Geraldine, eastern New Zealand – there to try to launch large balloons that allow access to the Internet – is that this farmer began to assimilate the size and scope of the call received .

is no longer secret. MacKenzie can count, as did the magazine Wired , the hustle that community with the Project Team Loon, who on Saturday announced the launch in the region of 30 giant balloons, equipped with a relay system signal Internet.

The reception is being tested experimentally in 50 locations Canterbury where Internet access is difficult. The idea of ??Google is this: try connectivity to remote areas, which for 100 days will receive Internet speeds that the company says are comparable or even superior to 3G.

balloons, made of plastic, inflate the air, coming to be 15 feet in diameter, and are transported by the wind “until altitudes twice those of commercial flights,” said Loon Project, created two years ago in incubation at Google X, a secret lab group U.S..

With a control system altitude distance you can put the balloons in areas where at any given time, the better to convey signal to earth. At the bottom of the balloons are attached to the transmission system and all electronics as well as a solar panel power generator.

Hayden MacKenzie and his wife, Anna, were the first to experience the connectivity in the morning Thursday. Before, the Wired , who accompanied the team on the ground Loon Project, Hayden did not hide the surprise of being inlaid with a team at Google.

The balloons used by Google that keep the volume relatively stable even before temperature changes, are inspired with a concept decades, says the BBC. The idea on which they are based has already been tried by NASA, has been developed for the U.S. Air Force in 1950.

To ensure the Internet connection, Google teamed up with one operator New Zealand telecommunications. After the experience in this country, the team hopes to test the proje ct in Australia, South Africa, Uruguay and Chile, says AFP.