Since 1821 the Guardian provides professional articels for long time, this one too: Weather balloons carrying instruments have been in regular use since the 1930s. Instrumented weather balloons are the traditional solution, and thousands are released every day. But these are at the mercy of the wind. They have become part of popular culture, partly because they sometimes get mistaken for UFOs:) Here are drones: Drones offer an alternative and the US company Meteomatics has taken the idea further with Meteobase, a base station on the ground with a drone that can be launched and recovered automatically. The base is highly weather resistant!