Retired ER nurse Jim Hawker keeps his eyes out for trouble in his neighborhood. He’s not fond of speeders — he’s seen many unthinkably horrible results from accidents. But what he saw Thursday rated an immediate call to the Powell Police Department.

“I didn’t know what it was, but with the Chinese balloons floating over Montana last year, I thought I should call,” he said Friday in an interview with the Tribune.

Officer Matt Koritnik responded to the scene, but he couldn’t see anything until he took a look through Hawker’s binoculars. He thought it looked like a very large balloon and noticed something strange; the balloon was hovering at about 30,000-feet and was not moving. That seemed odd so he started making calls.

“I had never seen anything quite like it,” Koritnik said. “I thought initially, you know, it was similar to the ones that were floating around last year.”

First he called the National Weather Service in Riverton, but they weren’t much help. Then he called Powell city official Ben Hubbard, who, among many other jobs, is the Powell Municipal Airport manager. Hubbard called the Salt Lake City office of the Air Route Traffic Control Center, which covers approximately 350,000 square miles of airspace over all or part of the states of Oregon, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, Nevada and, of course, Wyoming.

They told Hubbard they would look into it, but later when he called back they denied knowing anything about it. It was all very suspicious. So Koritnik, wanting evidence, called area erstwhile photographer extraordinaire Greg Wise. Koritnik knew Wise would have the equipment to get a photograph of the balloon.

Wise looked to the sky near the hospital, but couldn’t see anything. He then followed Koritnik back to Hawker’s home, where they would know exactly where to look.

“It was hard, but you could see it with your naked eye if you knew exactly where to look. Otherwise, if you were just scanning the sky, you’d never see it,” Wise said, adding that he couldn’t see details other than the sun glimmering off the balloon.

He took pictures the best he could, but he guessed the balloon could have been 20 miles away.

“I know it was way past Byron,” he said.

Then a short time after sending photos to Koritnik the story unveiled itself as World View Vice President Phil Wocken cleared up the confusion for K2 Radio in Casper.

These balloons are often confused with weather balloons, which Wocken says ascend into the stratosphere and then pop when they get too high.

"Ours is a much more sophisticated stratospheric vehicle that can be remotely navigated to certain areas and stay aloft for days, weeks, or months at a time,” he told the radio station.

This two-balloon system — also known as a stratollite — launched Aug. 31 from Arizona. Their primary customer is Space Environment Technologies, in collaboration with NASA, as part of the Automated Radiation Measurements for Aerospace Safety (ARMAS) project.

The ARMAS project uses data for Earth science research to improve aerospace safety and has made a significant contribution toward improving U.S. and international aviation safety by laying the groundwork for an automated, reliable operational system that can monitor the natural galactic and solar radiation environment at commercial aviation flight levels.

Their data also helps the federal government detect and monitor wildfire activity over long periods of time or help organizations like NASA study the planet and space from the stratosphere to improve weather forecasting, understand the impacts of solar radiation or measure long-term changes in our planet and her atmosphere. Also, World View Enterprises helps assist the U.S. Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security with their intelligence and surveillance needs to protect national security interests.

The sketchy conversation with Air Route Traffic Control Center now started making sense. The lack of answers may be partially responsible for conspiracy theories that were floating around the state about the balloon. Wise said it is understandable considering the times we live in.

“I mean, I just thought it was a weather balloon,” he said. “I don't see them every day, so I wasn't too worried about it. But still, in the back of our minds, everybody's mind, was what went on Montana last year and how that thing floated over us.”