A poor man's satellite?

[Gord_in_Toronto]

A balloon that stays in the sky for days if not months at a time. It can fly to a distant location and then hover with a "a station-keeping radius as low as 0.62 miles (1 km)"

Solar-powered airship completes 12-day stratospheric flight test

Sceye's solar-powered airships could eventually fly for years at a time, providing crucial data for disaster response.

interestingengineering.com

It will be interesting to see if commercial cases are found to use it.

 

[Norman Alexander]

A balloon that stays in the sky for days if not months at a time. It can fly to a distant location and then hover with a "a station-keeping radius as low as 0.62 miles (1 km)"

Solar-powered airship completes 12-day stratospheric flight test

Sceye's solar-powered airships could eventually fly for years at a time, providing crucial data for disaster response.

interestingengineering.com

It will be interesting to see if commercial cases are found to use it.

They can supplement fire watch towers and other bush and forest fire warning methods.

Search and rescue in remote locations.

Aerial surveillance similar to geosats but with much better resolution.

Weather stations.

I hesitate to say aerial observation for Military, as they would be easy targets.

 

[Pope130]

I think this could be used to restore emergency cell phone service after a natural disaster.