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THE GREAT NON-STOP AROUND THE WORLD BALLOON RACE
Chapter Six - August 7, 1998 A favorable meteorological window allowed Steve Fossett in his Solo Spirit balloon to liftoff from the Malvinas Soccer Stadium in Mendoza, Argentina, at 6:30 PM CDT (23:30 UTC) this evening. It was a perfect moonlit launch. The balloon rapidly gained altitude and headed over the mountains toward Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay. Then, hopefully, across the Atlantic Ocean to the tip of South Africa and on East over Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific Ocean back to South America. Steve reported by satellite, "All systems Go." Our prayers for a safe and successful journey ride with him. Godspeed, Steve! We will post daily Bulletins on the progress of the flight. All the information, in detail, is contained in his website listed below. In Chaper Four of this series we told you about his new balloon but were wrong in assuming that he would use a pressurized capsule. Once again he will be counting on his superb physical condition and an oxygen mask to carry him through the trip. His gondola has been super-insulated against the high altitude cold, his cabin heater redesigned, and his fuel capacity increased. Never-the-less it will be a rough trip. One which an average man probably could not survive. Steve has proven that he is more than an average man; many times in many ways. We just have to sit back and watch & wait while he proves himself once again to be one of the worlds' supermen. He's doing it the hard way. What an adventure! The new Solo Spirit website, listed below, has maps and charts for tracking the flight. You can spend hours educating yourself about ballooning by following the many, many links to all kinds of data that tells about the flight. It is extremely comprehensive and easy to navigate. Its lots of fun. Just one click and you can see for yourself. Follow the flight from the site. It is updated every hour. The balloon is carrying the NASA/JPL Aerobot Scientific Package. The automatically transmitted data will tell you a dozen things like the altitude, vertical & horizontal wind speed, ground speed, geographic position and almost anything else. This data stream can even be downloaded to your computer. Talk about organized! Wow! Steve is communicating with his Mission Control Center in St. Louis via a laptop computer & satellite link. The reliability of this system has been proven on his earlier flights. You can send him or people in the Control Center a message by clicking on the Guest Book box on the website. Don't expect an answer. They are much too busy! All the messages will be compiled and given to the recipient after the flight is over. There are six teams committed with one of them in the air, and two still mulling it over, for a total of eight possible entrants so far this coming season. One, the South African Global Conqueror, is looking for a sponsor. The Global Hilton has withdrawn their website from the Internet. Are they going to replace it with a new one? … or are they giving up? All queries have been met with stony silence. The Breitling website team has just informed us they will be on vacation until August 16th. Will they announce their entry into this seasons field when they get back? They carefully avoid answering. The suspense builds. All of this adds to the excitement! What will happen if Steve succeeds? This would make him the first and the winner of the Budweiser Cup. Will some drop out? Or will they continue on? One of them might set a new record by circumnavigating the globe quicker, or by going farther or higher. Every also-ran will have, never-the-less, a significant achievement. The team websites are listed in the Index. Just click on an address to go take a look. All are interesting and informative. Bookmark ARMCHAIR so you can check back with a single click to keep in touch with new events in this great adventure. |