{"id":1494,"date":"2014-04-01T09:59:39","date_gmt":"2014-04-01T07:59:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/?p=1494"},"modified":"2014-04-01T09:59:39","modified_gmt":"2014-04-01T07:59:39","slug":"eye-of-mother-and-monkey-masters-by-masashi-kakauda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/2014\/04\/01\/eye-of-mother-and-monkey-masters-by-masashi-kakauda\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;Eye of Mother and monkey masters&#8221; &#8211; by Masashi Kakauda"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"a246cb021816c9f476ac16cb834b7362\" data-index=\"1\" style=\"float: none; margin:10px 0 10px 0; text-align:center;\">\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\"><!--\r\ngoogle_ad_client = \"ca-pub-2865779868887008\";\r\n\/* Android box *\/\r\ngoogle_ad_slot = \"1345074415\";\r\ngoogle_ad_width = 336;\r\ngoogle_ad_height = 280;\r\n\/\/-->\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\"\r\nsrc=\"http:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/show_ads.js\">\r\n<\/script>\n<\/div>\n<p>Masashi Kakauda sent us this letter ten years ago:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Dear Balloonists,<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-1495\" alt=\"clown hot air balloon\" src=\"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/clown_hot_air_balloon-283x300.jpg\" width=\"283\" height=\"300\" \/>We are very glad to send big news for participants of 2004 World Hot Air Balloon Grand Prix on 1st of April 2004.<\/p><!--CusAds0-->\n<p>The big news is that the World Grand Prix system will be used to the selection procedure for the 2006 World Championship in Motegi, Japan.<\/p>\n<p>This was discussed at the CIA Plenary Meeting in Debrecen, Hungary last month.\u00a0 The voting delegates agreed to our proposal without any objection, since they were bit tired to talk about the travel subsidy of 2004 Worlds in Australia. (As far as I know, the Australian organizer decided to reward to participants by 1000 bananas or oranges to each competitor, who can not have enough travel subsidy.) Anyhow, top winners of 2005 WHGPX will be invited to the 2006 Worlds in Japan.\u00a0 For that reason, the 2005 WHGPX will be competed with up to 100 teams and one million cash prizes with a HONDA NSX, but the minimum requirement of entry is 3,000 flight hours in a hot air balloon as PIC.\u00a0 (This regulation is not applied to Japanese, since Japan is the host country!)\u00a0 We think that this World Championship should be planned for only top pilots in the world, even though only\u00a010 competitors available.<\/p>\n<p>These several years, we have announced robot observers.\u00a0 But now we must return to trusting humanity.\u00a0 So we decided to use human observers in balloon competitions.\u00a0 These products are currently developed by several computer companies.<\/p>\n<p>The new observing system, called &#8216;Eye of Mother&#8217;, consists of TV cameras, sensors GPS units and radios.\u00a0 An observer is not required to be on board.\u00a0 They can watch a pilot activity or balloon maneuvering via TV cameras in a basket, at the burner flame and at the top of balloon.\u00a0 The motion sensor is also attached at a basket.<\/p>\n<p>So an observer is able to know whether a pilot makes a ground contact or not for a non-light contact.\u00a0 For a light ground contact, another electric magnetic sensor is covering a basket and can detect a contact with earth surface.\u00a0 The position of balloon is always monitored by GPS.\u00a0 Those data will be transmitted to the observer on the ground.\u00a0 The markers will be measured by a sensor which is implanted to at the centre of intersection.<\/p>\n<p>There are several advantages.\u00a0 An observer do not need to bear up working with a bloody pilot.\u00a0 They will not be required to go to the event place nor the competition centre.\u00a0 They can watch a computer screen with live monitors and sensing data.\u00a0 They participate in balloon competitions from their own home or room, with a coke and potato tips.\u00a0 An observer just sent their report to the competition centre by internet.\u00a0 The score will be calculated with monkey masters (sorry, this will become an old nickname).\u00a0 If an observer watches a very rapid decent or ascent or violating PZs, he\/she can send a warning message to a competitor.\u00a0 If he receives two warnings, it means &#8216;yellow&#8217; and 300 points penalty.\u00a0 If he receives one more, he will be disqualified from the task.\u00a0 Therefore, an observer will have much power to a competitor.<\/p>\n<p>The observers will be rewarded 10 bananas per a task flight and 100 bananas to monkey masters.<\/p>\n<p>We wish you have good flights and soft landings under blue skies and gentle winds.<\/p>\n<p>Soft Landings,<br \/>\nMasashi Kakuda<\/p>\n<p>PS: If you read this News Letter on 31st March or after 1st of April, it is your fault.\u00a0 I do not care your complaints, since my watches and clocks show 1st of April.<\/p>\n<p>Why I am using a banana in rewarding?\u00a0 Because, I want to eat it now.&#8221;<\/p>\n<!--CusAds0-->\n<div style=\"font-size: 0px; height: 0px; line-height: 0px; margin: 0; padding: 0; clear: both;\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Masashi Kakauda sent us this letter ten years ago: &#8220;Dear Balloonists, We are very glad to send big news for participants of 2004 World Hot Air Balloon Grand Prix on 1st of April 2004. The big news is that the World Grand Prix system will be used to the selection procedure for the 2006 World [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[54,123,138],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1494"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1494"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1494\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/balloon.hu\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}