In-Situ Turbulence and Particulate Measurements in Support of the BOLT II Flight Experiment

What is it about?

This paper describes the methods and results of a 10-day field campaign to measure the in-situ turbulence and particulate environment near the hypersonic descent of the BOLT II vehicle. Instruments were lofted on weather balloons to measure free stream conditions during a slow descent after partial lifting gas venting, covering an altitude range of 9-29 km. Recent work has noted the potential detrimental effects of these free stream disturbances on the laminar to turbulent transition in the boundary layer of a hypersonic vehicle, and this paper quantifies these disturbances with 4 balloon flights bracketing the BOLT II flight at 1 hour cadence, as well as 10 other flights in the days before and after.

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