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Fosset's Trying for Balloon Record Again

Posted by timothy on from the round-and-round-she-goes dept.

jcarley writes: "After crashing into the coral sea last time, adventurer Steve Fossett has launched from Western Australia on a another attempt at the first solo circumnavigation of the world in a balloon. These efforts seem highly prone to technical, weather or political disasters but so far it has been incident free. He has covered 1866km (1159 miles) so far and is in South Australia heading east. You can follow his progress." The site has quite a few cool images as well.

1 of 7 comments (clear)

  1. Ho hum by hubie · · Score: 3, Insightful

    These kinds of feats just don't have the glamor they used to. Especially since his gondola is all tricked out with hi-tech stuff. The balloon even flies itself so that he can sleep. I understand that this is a very tough feat, particularly since this is his 5th attempt at it, but it just doesn't have that extra dimension that makes it very exciting (it isn't a first circumnavigation, because that was done in the 16th century; it doesn't demonstrate the possibilites of future transport or a smaller world; it doesn't have great political implications; nor is it a demonstration of new technologies and engineering). I doubt that 100,000 people will storm the landing zone in celebration if he does make it around.