Getting Started

A walkthrough to get you from a fresh install to flying a task. Follow it in order the first time — each step builds on the one before.

What Box the Wind is

Box the Wind is a map- and position-centric app for hot air balloon competition flying (BFA / FAI AX rules). It shows you the day's tasks, your live position on street or aerial maps, navigation to the active target (bearing, distance, and closest approach), wind drift, the contest area and prohibited zones, and live pilot-to-crew tracking. It works fully offline once your maps are downloaded.

Everything — targets, goals, zones — is expressed in 4/4, resolved through a grid reference you pin to your contest area. Set that first; an off-area reference silently mislocates every target.

The screen at a glance: a glance strip across the top carries TGT, altitude (AGL or MSL), BRG, HDG, STR, DIST, and MISS for the active target, plus CTR for the map's center crosshair. A status pill sits top-left — in pilot mode it's also your Live control. The bottom control bar holds Tasks, Declare Goal (a car button to the active target instead, in crew mode), the Map/Aerial toggle, the follow-mode button, a wrench for map tools, and the Settings gear. Full breakdown of every cell and button: the Guide.

1. Set the grid center

The 4/4 grid is anchored to a reference center, which decides exactly where each 4/4 coordinate lands. Set this to your competition area first so every target and goal is correct.

1. Pan and zoom the map so its center crosshair sits roughly over your launch field / contest area. Watch the CTR readout to confirm.
2. Open Settings → Grid Center. It shows the current UTM zone and center.
3. Tap “Use Map Center as Grid Center.” Confirm — note this also clears any offline maps tied to the old area, since they no longer match.

The 1 km grid lines and the 4/4 numbering now follow your area. (Whole-kilometre grid lines fall exactly where a 4/4 ends in 00.) You can re-center any time.

2. Download offline maps (optional)

Skip this if you'll have signal where you fly; the map streams over the network. Download when coverage is patchy or you don't want to rely on it.

Open Settings → Offline Maps → “Download Offline Maps…,” tap the cells covering your area on the download grid, and download. The same pass fetches the aerial imagery, the street basemap, and terrain elevation for the area, so the map and your AGL altitude keep working with no signal.

3. Import your zones and contest area

The app starts empty — you import your own airspace and contest boundaries from the files the event director distributes: KML, OziExplorer PLT, or GPX (the format is detected automatically, so you just pick the file). There are four prohibited-zone classifications plus the contest area:

• Red — ceiling enforced.
• Red Road — a squared keepout tunnel along the centerline.
• Yellow — display-only.
• Blue — floor enforced.

Open Settings → Zones and use the per-category Import… buttons; picking a file imports it immediately. For a contest area, tap its row to make it the active one — tapping the active row again deactivates it, so none can be active at once. The active area validates declared goals (step 6) and is one of the warning surfaces. Altitude limits and full detail: the Guide.

4. Load the day's tasks

Tasks come from a WatchMeFly Task Data Sheet (TDS).

1. Tap Tasks in the bottom bar.
2. Paste the WatchMeFly TDS URL into the Import field and tap Import. The app fetches and parses it into an editable task list — it accepts both the structured TDS web page and many task-sheet PDFs, auto-detecting which you pasted.

A parse is never trusted blindly — check the tasks before you fly. Editing tasks, the launch point, and clearing or sharing the list: the Guide.

5. Set the source

The source decides where your balloon position comes from. Open Settings → Source:

• Replay — plays back a recorded flight; great for practice and demos (no signal needed).
• Crew — receives the pilot's live position over your private channel. Use this on the chase-crew device.
• Pilot · GPS — uses this device's GPS as the live position. Use this in the basket.

For the live modes, set a Flight code and Password. The crew and pilot who enter the same code and password share a private channel — no one else can see your position. A flight code is required to broadcast: with no code the app runs “solo” (records and navigates, but sends nothing).

A Wi-Fi-only iPad has no GPS receiver of its own — see Does my iPad have GPS? before you rely on Pilot · GPS in the basket. This is where that gap first bites, and it looks like a bug rather than missing hardware.

6. Go live and pick a target

In Pilot mode, tap the status pill (top-left) — “Go Live” — to start. The app records your flight to a GPX file and, if you've set a flight code, broadcasts your position to the crew. The pill then shows Rec mm:ss (and · solo with no flight code set); tap it again and confirm to stop.

In the task list, tap a task's A / B target chips to make one the active target. The glance strip then shows live BRG, DIST, and MISS, with a green target line and a purple drift line on the map. To set a quick ad-hoc target instead, tap the map to drop one; Clear target removes it.

Declaring goals for pilot-declared tasks (PDG, FON) and sharing the task list live with the crew: the Guide.

Where to go next

A one-line reference for everything above: the Cheat Sheet. Every screen and tool in full: the Guide. Setting up the chase-crew device: On the crew device. Answers to specific questions: the FAQ.

Questions or bugs: [email protected].