THE FRENCH BALLOON PROGRAM 2013-2016

With over 50 years' experience in the field, the French Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales (CNES) goes on supporting a significant scientific ballooning program. In particular so because balloons still give a unique access to near space science. Over the past 6 years, most of the systems, beginning by the Zero Pressure Balloons, had to be renewed to comply with more stringent Safety constraints and to growing performance and reliability requirements from the scientific missions. This paper will give an overview of the CNES new capabilities and services for operational balloon activities, and their availability status. The scientific launch campaigns of the past two years will be presented. A focus will be made on the results of the Stratoscience 2014 flight campaign from Timmins, Ontario, using the NOSYCA command and control system for zero pressure balloons, qualified in 2013. The ChArMEx campaign (Chemistry-AeRosol Mediterranean Experiment) performed in 2013 from the Baleares islands and from the south of France, with Boundary Layer Pressurized Balloons will also be presented as well as the LOAC-VOLTAIRE experiment, carried out from Aire-sur-l'Adour (France), through the flights of 20 instrumented light expandable balloons. An outlook of the new stratospheric long duration flight systems currently studied at CNES will be given. The scientific launch campaigns and the main payloads in the study for the near future will also be presented.