It's a bird, it's a plane, it's... NASA?
While the town is a destination for a diverse set of visitors, yesterday (Aug. 4) the humble municipality received a truly stellar guest.
NASA817, a DC-8 aircraft dubbed the flying laboratory, flew an irregular route over southern Ontario, bringing it over Halton Hills twice. It passed over several GTA municipalities like Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton and Oshawa, among many others.
The plane is part of a collaboration between NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to monitor air quality levels over North American 'mega-cities.' The Atmospheric Emissions and Reactions Observed from Mega-cities to Marine Areas project (AEROMMA) has, so far, gathered data over New York City, Chicago and will be gathering over Los Angeles after Toronto.
"We need to have a better understanding of the current sources of pollutants and what happens to these pollutants once they are in the atmosphere,” AEROMMA mission scientist Carsten Warneke said in a press release from NOAA.
The plane took off from Wright-Patterson Airforce Base near Dayton, Ohio, flew a path over Detroit and then flew east towards Toronto, taking a non-linear route on the way there.
It passed over Halton Hills for the first time at 1 p.m. and again around 3:25 p.m. at a relatively low altitude. During both visits, it was at a height of 610 metres. For comparison, the CN Tower is 553 metres tall and the DC-8 airplane's maximum altitude is 12,800 metres.
Sky gazers hoping to chart NASA817's journey can get a play-by-play on flightradar24.com.
