Balloon Used to Fight Drugs Is Destroyed
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RIO GRANDE CITY, Tex. — A huge helium-filled balloon that helped provide communications for federal drug enforcement broke loose from its moorings and was destroyed, officials said.
They said high winds may have caused a cable on the 233-foot-long tethered “aerostat,” one of three such balloons along the Texas-Mexico border, to break late Tuesday.
The Air Force operates the fleet of six aerostats--the three in Texas plus two in Arizona and one in New Mexico. The balloons, which cost $12 million each, form a 2,000-mile-long “radar fence” capable of tracking aircraft.
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