Amazing the stuff you’ll find online. While looking at NASA documents for a friend’s birthday, I came across this spiky ball contraption used by NASA in 1968.
Any guess what this could be?
- Oversized foot massager?
- Giant mace-ball weapon?
- Colossal doggie toy?
The real answer is in the comments.
The photo comes from page 11 of the 46-page report, “Accuracy of wind data obtained by tracking a Jimsphere wind sensor simultaneously with two FPS-16 radars“. Report number NASA-TM-X-53752.
This is actually a balloon to help them measure the accuracy of their wind sensor systems. 398 cones cover this balloon. Each cone is three-inches tall.