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February 27, 2026

I have let this site age badly. It was never supposed to be pretty, it was supposed to be useful. Well, this week I went through and worked on fixing everything that was broken.

One of the most useful sites that I like, and where all the links used to go, was MesoWest (University of Utah) where it seemed all the weather stations on the Internet were aggregated. Back when I flew commercially, we used this site extensively. In fact, I used it for other recreational activities when I traveled. I always went to the main page and never realized that the links below it on my weather page no longer worked. When I discovered the broken links, I noticed the planned sunsetting of MesoWest by 12/31/2026. I was sad. I liked that site, even if the UI was rather dated and clunky.

Well, there are a couple of options that I have played with. Some of the links on the list are now from the Weather.gov site managed by NOAA. Unfortunately, it only works within sites observed by the Western Region Headquarters (which is fine for all of Utah but not available if you wanted to fly in Tulsa, OK, for example). The other site is Synoptic Data that was recommended as an alternate to MesoWest. They have a much nicer UI and is almost perfect if it wasn’t for the lack of plus (+) and minus (-) buttons for zooming. Clearly, they designed it for touch screens but I despise having to zoom with a two-finger pinch because it only works for me on the third or fourth try. I tolerate it on my phone but for travel and ballooning I use a MacBook Air rather than an iPad because of my hatred of touch screens. (Rant over). Synoptic Data claims to be global and will work just fine if you travel outside Utah just like MesoWest did for me.

To use Synoptic Data, just go to their viewer in a web browser (https://viewer.synopticdate.com). If you click the link, you’ll go to the viewer’s main page which shows most of North America on a map and shows temperatures by default. The link that I created on my list on the home page is for a specific view of that map which shows Utah / Wind Speed / US Radar Composite / US Counties that you can check out here. I find putting in the county lines useful for navigating their map (that is if you know your Utah counties). The links below the Synoptic Data Viewer link on the my home page are for specific weather stations and gives you tabular data.

Lastly, I have added a link to Wind Line – Balloon Pilot Forecast. This is a new site to me and I have not played with it much so I’ll leave that for you to mess around with.

Thanks and safe landings!

Tom

Introduction

Welcome to BALLOONWX.US (Utah Balloon WX). My name is Tom Rathke and I have been flying hot air balloons for over 41 years. In that time I have mostly flown commercially and done a lot of fun flying including trying to find new areas to fly in remote areas of Utah. I have worked for a balloon manufacturer, owned and operated a scenic flight operation in Park City, UT (late 80’s and into the 90’s) and Moab, UT (1990’s). I was the first person issued a commercial use permit for over 600 square miles of public lands in Southern Utah.

I can go on and on about my accomplishments but, really, that’s not the purpose of this site. I just wanted to give you a framework of why I posted this site. One of my jobs was flying scenic flights for a ride operation flying 250’s. Anyone who’s flown commercially knows the pressure to fly is real. So the best way to make a responsible Go/No-Go decision is to get as much weather data as possible. Since I was also running the company’s web site, I started aggregating weather date onto a page that the owner and pilots could access with relevant weather information.

Now that I no longer fly commercially and the company that I flew for no longer exists, I miss that weather page. So I decided to recreate that page… in fact, a more improved version of that page… for me to use. And now I’m sharing it with all.

Use this web site as you like and at your own risk. I’m no weatherman and you are responsible for gathering your own information, verifying its authenticity and making your own Go/No-Go decisions.

SAFE LANDINGS!