by Tom Hamilton
This winter five balloon teams will be attempting to become the first to circumnavigate the globe by balloon. Magazine articles and television shows have highlighted this raceÑoften called the last great aviation challenge.
Lost in the din of noise is another ballooning challengeÑthe race to outer space. While no one has actually stated that such a competition exists, two teams are hoping they will be the first.
Dymocks Odyssey Flyer is one of the teams attempting to be the first around the world. Their strategy is to fly as high as 130,000 feet above the earth during the day. At night they hope the balloon will not descend below 80,000 feet. Over the course of three to four weeks the team hopes to complete the illusive goal of circumnavigation. In doing so they will literally be flying at the edge of space.
The other entrant has one of the most widely known record setting pilots on its team. Per Lindstrand and Colin Prescot hope to set a new balloon altitude record next April with a flight to 130,000 feet.
Lindstrand is also attempting to team with Richard Branson to be the first to circumnavigate the globe in a different balloon. Their launch window opens in mid-November and ends in late February.
The challenge facing the global teams is formidable. Equipment and man will be tested to the limits. Numerous attempts have been made by a variety of teams. Most have ended prematurely because of equipment malfunctions. What has been attempted so far has been part of the learning curve to accomplish to feat.
Steve Fossett made it half way around last winter demonstrating that with the right weather, equipment, and physical strength the holy grail of ballooning can be attained.
As difficult a feat as circumnavigation is it pales in comparison to flying to the edge of space. The environment is so inhospitable above 63,000 feet that an equipment malfunction can mean instant death.
The aeronauts attempting to journey into space will not be traveling in uncharted air like their global team mates. Many flights since the late 1920s have been attempted.
Back in the 1950s and early 1960s, before the U.S. space program sent astronauts up in liquid-fuel rockets, a small group of daring, brilliant men made the first exploratory flights into the upper stratosphere to the edge of outer space. They made the flights suspended beneath plastic balloons.
They saw things no one had ever seen, and they experienced conditions no one was sure they could survive. Reaching the edge of space was not designed as pre-rocket space exploration. These projects were looking for safe ways to return pilots of jet aircraft back to earth should they have to bail out above 40,000 feet.
Captain Joe Kittinger would make five high altitude flights, Lt. Col. David Simons stayed aloft for a full day and night in a primitive pressurized capsule to become one of the first to see the curvature of the earth.
Others would lose their life. One Soviet died when he jumped from a balloon at 93,970 feet and his parachute opened almost immediately. He either froze to death or ran out of oxygen to breathe.
The last of the high altitude balloon flights was actually a private venture by an American named Nicholas Piantanida. Nick wanted to recapture the parachute free fall record set by the Soviets. Kittinger's jumped was not sanction or recognized by the Federation Aeronautique Internationale.
Piantanida's three attempts illustrate what can go wrong in a balloon flight to outer space. The first attempt, in October 1965, ended when his balloon, Strato Jump, reached 22,700 feet and a six knot wind sheared the top right off the balloon. Nick parachuted safely back to the city dump in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Raven Industries had built the gondola for that flight. Raven then took over building the envelopes for the next two attempts and managed the flight operations.
During Strato Jump II, February 1966, Piantanida reached an altitude of 123,500. Because he was unable to disconnect from his onboard oxygen supply ground control cut the gondola from the balloon. The altitude record would not be recognized. Nick survived the descent and parachute landing inside the gondola.
In May 1966, Piantanida ascended one more time in Strato Jump III. Something went dreadfully wrong at 57.600 feet. Ground control heard a sudden gush of air in their monitors and headphones and then Piantanida's voice, gasping and screaming.
"Emergency!"
Again the gondola was cut from the balloon by ground control. A drone chute opened as planned but it slowed the descent. 25 minutes later the gondola landed and an Air Force rescue team pulled a moaning and gasping Piantanida out. He would die in a hospitable four months later.
The challenges of space flight in a balloon are not to be taken lightly. Following are stories about the two projects now under way. In the former, Dymocks Odyssey Flyer - An Update, Balloon Life speaks with Troy Bradley, who has left the project, about some his thoughts on the flight.
The later article, Reach for the Stars, British writer Paul McBride details the plans of yet another of Per Lindstrand's record setting attempts. Per and Colin Prescot want to ascend to 130,000 feet and break the existing record of 113,740 feet.