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Could a high-altitude jet-stream wind have been blowing the smoke cloud? Futch had checked this no. The winds above 20,000 feet were the usual westerlies and the jet stream was far to the north. Several months later I talked to a captain who had been at Luke when this sighting occurred. He knew the F-84 pilot and he'd heard him tell his story in great detail.
At 33,000 feet there was a momentary sensation as if the ship were tilted sharply. It wasn't. The instruments denied any change from level rise. The upward-soaring complex of flying things had simply risen into a jet-stream, one of those wildly rushing wind-floods of the upper atmosphere. "Eastern velocity four hundred," said Mike from the communicator. "Now four-twenty-five.... Four-forty."
Still climbing, the balloon would have reached a level where a strong wind was blowing in a southerly direction. The jet-stream winds were not being plotted in 1948 but the weather chart shows strong indications of a southerly bend in the jet stream for this day. Jet stream or not, the balloon would have moved rapidly south, still climbing.
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