The weather forecast for the weekend of February 3-4 was, in a word,
miserable. An Arctic high pressure system was plunging through the nation’s
mid-section leaving a wake of record low temperatures behind it. Wind chills as
low as 50 to 60 degrees below zero were not uncommon. Perfect ballooning
weather if you’re out to set a world duration record or two.
In McAlester, Oklahoma Bill Bussey of Longview, Texas and Jetta Schantz of Jacksonville Beach, Florida are the talk of the town as the two aeronauts and their crews arrived on Friday night with two trailers full of equipment and almost 500 gallons of propane between them. The two of them are out to once again write their names in the world record books for ballooning.
Bussey hopes to break the AX-6 duration record, currently 13 hours and 24 minutes. The flight will be his sixth major attempt at a world record, thus the flight has been dubbed SkyQuest 6 in recognition of his previous five successes.
Schantz is preparing to take the third and final step in a five year dream to set a feminine world record in each of three categories, altitude, distance and duration. She hopes to break the 22-year old feminine duration record of 11 hours and 10 minutes for AX-7 hot air balloons. Privately she has set a personal goal of flying for 15 hours. Jetta’s team adopted the name Vision Flight III.
World record attempts are usually done by a singular group of people concentrating on one goal. But these flights would be different. Bussey and Schantz had agreed months earlier to share the planning, staging, equipping and management of their two flights as equally as possible. So as the two pilots and their crews prepared for inflation in Oklahoma, a joint command center is opened in Longview, Texas to handle all communications between balloons, chase crews, media and other interested parties.
In another unique step, Bob Rice of Weather Window Inc. will serve as meteorologist for both flights, the first time he had directed two flights from the same forecasting effort.
THE BALLOONS
Much of the equipment to be used by the two aeronauts is already world record tested...
Schantz will fly the 77,500 cubic foot envelope that she successfully flew to 32,657 feet in 1994 to establish nine new female world altitude records. The envelope is a standard hot air balloon envelope built by Aerostar. She will utilize a set of Thunder & Colt C-3 Magnum burners provided by Balloon Repairs of East Texas (Longview, TX) while the basket she will fly is on loan from Bill Bussey. It is the same basket Bussey used in 1993 on his world record flight from Amarillo, TX to near Canada.
Bussey will use the same 56,000 cubic foot experimental balloon flown last February on his world record flight from Chanute, Kansas to Darien, Georgia. This envelope is built of a metallic fabric identical to that used by his mentor, Per Lindstrand on his successful hot air balloon crossing of the Pacific Ocean. To conserve weight, Bussey will forgo the standard double burners for a single burner system. (That decision would nearly cost Bussey the record.)
Both baskets are constructed of lightweight aluminum tubing with pipe insulation for padding and then shrink wrapped. Schantz will launch with 240 gallons of fuel while Bussey plans to carry 270 gallons.
INFLATION
The two teams arrived in McAlester, Oklahoma on Friday night after battling through an ice storm that tore into East Texas a day earlier. McAlester had been selected by Bob Rice as the best launch site for the flights. The plan was for a joint launch at about 4:00 p.m. on Saturday afternoon. Assuming a flight level of 500 feet, the balloons would track south, nearing Dallas Texas by daybreak, then turn north with the sunrise and head back to north into Oklahoma. (A world record flight and a box-it seemed, and would be, too good to be true!)
Officials at the McAlester Airport excitedly agreed to host the launch and provided much appreciated hangar space for pre-flight assembly of the equipment. After an early Saturday breakfast, the teams began preparing for inflation.
Everyone was prepared for the cold, about 10 F, but the 10 knot winds were not welcome. Rice had predicted the winds would slacken to near light and variable by late afternoon but it never happened. The pesky winds would nearly ground the balloons, but for different reasons.
Bussey was first to inflate but could not get enough heat into the balloon to get lift. The envelope was not equipped with a skirt or scoop and the winds were so strong the burner’s flame was blown almost horizontal, scorching a few panels of the balloon’s throat. In the end, Bussey would burn nearly 50 gallons of fuel just in an effort to get airborne. He launched at 5:40 P.M. CST.
Schantz meanwhile had different problems. The combined weight of the basket (with 240 gallons of propane loaded) and the torque of the 10 knot wind were literally pulling apart the carabiners that held envelope and basket together. Once, twice she would attempt to inflate but with the same results. Down to her last four carabiners she opted to off load 3, 20-gallon fuel tanks for the final attempt. With the load lightened, Vision Flight III took to the air at approximately 6:35 P.M., almost an hour later and several miles behind Bussey. The dream of a beautiful side by side launch and flying through the night together were gone.
Darkness settled in early on the two balloons but a full moon made for a beautiful companion in the sky and provided both pilots and crews with unexpected, but appreciated night vision. Early in the flight both balloons tracked between 180 and 200 , traveling south into Texas almost directly along the Indian Nation Turnpike.
Throughout the flights both pilots planned to jettison (by parachute) fuel tanks as they emptied them. Bussey would drop his first 55-gallon tank near Hugo, Oklahoma while Schantz dropped her first 20-gallon tank just north of Antlers, Oklahoma. Nearly one quarter of the way into their flights the two balloons were about eleven miles apart. (Bussey eventually recovered all of his tanks, Schantz almost none).
Unknown by the command center, Bussey had experienced almost complete burner failure early in the flight. Both main blast valves had failed and because his burner used liquid fuel for its pilot light, that too was unavailable. Bussey would have to fly more than 14 hours with a single functioning liquid fire backup burner valve.
The extreme cold (surface temperatures were near zero and no better than 15-20 between 1,000 and 2,000 feet high) began to take its toll early. Schantz’ radios were virtually useless throughout the flight. Batteries froze and so did everything else. Vapor in the fuel caused a cloud to form inside Schantz’ envelope. This would first drip and later rain down on her, the moisture then freezing and coating everything with ice. At one point, Schantz would say later, "My entire red line was coated with ice. I was afraid the extra weight might pull the top loose, so I picked up the line and set it atop a tank to take the strain off."
In the wee hours of the morning, Schantz busied herself counting the icicles
forming on the envelope’s throat-more than 150 at one time, the longest
measuring over 18 inches!
As the two balloons tracked southeasterly into east Texas (they would pass directly over Tyler, just 30 miles from the command center in Longview) Bussey was able to make contact with the command center and the tone of his voice was cause for alarm. He was clearly stressed and disoriented. He would later admit to hallucinations-seeing buildings in the sky and noting the farm fields below took on the shape of states, as if he were peering down at some huge wall map. The failed burner was forcing Bussey to fly the balloon with his arms constantly held high over his head. He could not use gloves, and his eyes could no longer adjust to the on and off glare from the burner. His GPS was frozen and had no idea where he was.
Compounding our concern, the chase van had thrown its fan belt just before midnight. Fortunately Micki Killingsworth, the seamstress who built Bussey’s envelope at T&C US, had made the trip to Oklahoma to see the launch. Now she and her overcrowded van were pressed into service. Lagging behind the balloon, no contact with the crew was also wearing on Bussey’s mind.
From Longview we organized and dispatched a second chase team and near Tyler, at about 1:30 A.M., both balloons and four chase vehicles (Schantz had planned for two chase vehicles) all were reunited and the mood in the command center and in the air improved dramatically. Both teams were now more than halfway home.
SUNRISE
Following his successful SkyQuest 4 and 5 flights, Bussey had often remarked about the beauty of sunrise seen from a balloon. Schantz, who previously had never flown at night, later recalled the emotion of the moment.
"I couldn’t help it," she would say. "The long, cold, lonely night was over at last. I started singing aloud and sang every song I could think of that had anything to do with the sun!"
Shortly before dawn’s first light, Schantz had another moment all her own. She had broken the 22-year old feminine AX-7 world duration record. With no radio contact to the crew or command center it was the moment to savor alone. Now she had only to fly through the sunrise, complete her personal goal of a 15 hour flight, then land safely. Bussey’s record would come an hour and 21 minutes later at 7:11 A.M. CST.
When Bussey broke the record he was already flying at near treetop level. Bob Rice had phoned the command center and advised Bussey to get into lower altitudes as protection against possible thermals shortly after sunrise. Rice reasoned the air would be more stable at the lower altitudes. Bussey still had more than 80 gallons of fuel left, enough to fly perhaps 10 or 12 hours longer. As the command center was planning with Rice how to avoid Houston and keep Bussey flying toward his real goal, the AX-7 duration record of more than 24 hours, word reached us that he was down.
The burner failure and the extreme cold proved to be the flight’s undoing. At treetop level Bussey had emptied the fuel tank from which his one functioning backup valve was fed. He now had to disconnect the fuel line, change tanks and relight his burner. While doing so he had no way to heat the balloon. At 200 feet, with a 10 knot wind, his frozen fingers and tank connections could not out perform nature. Bussey was forced down into a tree, one large limb poking a hole in the envelope which then rolled off the tree and into another as SkyQuest 6 slipped to the ground with a new duration record of 14 hours and 14 minutes. The flight ended in a farmer‘s field near Crockett, Texas.
Schantz meanwhile was still flying. Having remained a few hundred feet higher than Bussey, Schantz had turned southwest heading toward the Bryan/College Station area. Rice and the command center now considered the question of keeping Schantz in the air in pursuit of a distance record. She had traveled well over 300 miles. Unfortunately calculations showed she did not have the available fuel and Schantz would settle to a safe landing in Wellborn, Texas 15 hours and 11 minutes after launch!
THE CELEBRATION
Although both pilots and crew arrived back in Longview Sunday afternoon, everyone needed a good night’s sleep-the required champagne celebration would wait 24 hours.
Monday evening, everyone involved gathered at Bussey’s Longview Balloonport. Schantz and Bussey signed numerous champagne bottles for crew and friends, all seeking a special memento of the record flights.
For Bussey there was the realization that his tiny 56,000 cubic foot balloon can be repaired, that the AX-7 duration record is attainable and that there will very likely be a SkyQuest 7 later this winter. A symbolic toast was offered-"We broke the record, and everything else!"
For Schantz it was the culmination of a 5-year dream. She had conquered her first night flight, set a new world record (when homologated by the FAI Schantz’ flight will establish nine feminine world records for duration in AX-7-15 hot air balloons), and met her personal goal for a 15 hour flight.
Bob Rice has directed balloons across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. He has participated in the winning of an America’s Cup in sailing. Early on Sunday morning, February 4th, he remarked "...two world record flights from one forecast; that’s quite an accomplishment."
And just how bad was the weather that weekend? On Monday morning, Puxatawney Phil poked his head out of his burrow, saw his shadow and quickly predicted six more weeks of winter before scurrying back indoors!
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