About the Flight

Learn about the Solo Spirit flight, the balloon, the people involved, the science experiment, and what it's like to live in a balloon!

Background on ballooning & Fossett’s Solo Spirit

Steve Fossett and his balloon, Solo Spirit, are part of a long and colorful history.

Ballooning began in the late 1700s when brothers Jacques Etienne and Joseph Montgolfier, French papermakers, began experimenting with hot-air balloons. They launched their first balloon, made of cloth lined with paper and filled with smoke, on June 4, 1783, in Annonay, France. That September, they again launched a balloon, this one carrying a duck, a rooster and a sheep. The balloon stayed aloft about eight minutes and delivered the animals safely back to earth.

On Nov. 21 the same year, another Frenchman, scientist Jean Francois Pilatre de Rozier, ascended to an altitude of about 80 feet in the first manned balloon flight.

Ballooning quickly became the rage, especially in France. Other milestones in ballooning’s history include:

* The first balloon flight across the English Channel, Jan. 7, 1785, when Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and American physician John Jeffries crossed from Dover, England, to Calais, France, in two hours.

* The first manned flight into the stratosphere, in 1931, when Swiss physicist Auguste Piccard developed a pressurized cabin in which he and an assistant ascended from Augsburg, Germany, to 51,775 feet.

* The first transatlantic crossing, in August 1978, achieved by Ben Abruzzo, Maxie Anderson and Larry Newman, who set off from Presque Isle, Maine, and landed 40 miles west of Paris after a flight of 137 hours, 6 minutes.

* The first North American transcontinental flight, in May 1980, by Anderson and his son Kris, who flew from Fort Baker, Calif., to Matane, Quebec.

* The first Pacific crossing, in November 1981, when Abruzzo, Newman, Rocky Aoki and Ron Clark flew from Nagashima, Japan, to Covelo, Calif., in 84 hours, 31 minutes.

* The first solo transatlantic, September 1984, accomplished by Joseph W. Kittinger Jr., who took off from Caribou, Maine, and landed in northwestern Italy after a flight of nearly 84 hours.

* The first solo Pacific crossing, February 1995, when Fossett flew from Seoul, South Korea, to Mendham, Saskatchewan.

* The first crossing of the African continent, January 1997, during Fossett’s round-the-world attempt that ended in Sultanpur, India.

* First crossing of the European continent, January 1998, also by Fossett in a circumnavigation attempt that ended in Krasnodar, Russia.

* First crossing of the South Atlantic and the Indian oceans, August 1998, during Fossett’s solo global attempt originating in Mendoza, Argentina, and ending in the Coral Sea off Australia.

* First crossing of the Asian continent, December 1998, when Fossett teamed up with Richard Branson and Per Lindstrand in a circumnavigation effort that ditched close to Hawaii.

* The first circumnavigation of the globe by balloon, March 1999, when Swiss pilot Bertrand Piccard (grandson of Auguste) and his English co-pilot Brian Jones successfully circled the Earth.

To this list of distinguished accomplishments, Fossett and his team hope to add yet another — the First Solo Balloon Flight Round The World (RTW).

As Steve Fossett attempts to make the first solo RTW, he is depending on a score of people on the ground to help make the mission safe and smooth.

Steve Fossett, the pilot, is a Chicago businessman with a long list of adventures and world records to his credit, including many in ballooning.

Project Manager Tim Cole is responsible for the development and operational readiness of all Solo Spirit systems.

Marie Metzer, Chief Assistant to Project Manager Cole, will work in navigation and tracking. She obtained her pilot's license when she was 23 years old and shortly thereafter, bought a vintage 1946 Ercoupe airplane. In recent years, she founded a T-shirt company and traded on the Chicago Board of Trade in the Index Debt Energy Market-MAXI pit for six years. This is Metzer's third Solo Spirit mission.

Chief Meteorologist Bob Rice evaluates weather, calculates the projected balloon trajectory and recommends route adjustments to the pilot.

The Launch Team in Northam, Western Australia, is headed by Launchmaster, Dennis Brown. Bert Padelt is systems director, Andy Elson is the engineer, John Kugler is inflation director and David "Shorty" Ryan is logistics director.

Mission Control for Solo Spirit, located at Washington University in St. Louis, is responsible for maintaining communication with the balloon, mapping flight paths, and tracking the balloon's progress. Mission Control Director is Joe Ritchie. Additional members of Mission Control are Jim Mitchell and Kevin Stass.

The Science Team, directed by faculty members Keith Bennett and Mike Swartout, is a group of Washington University students assisting in mission control.

Media Director Judith Jasper Leicht, manages all communications with the media regarding Solo Spirit. Errol Considine is media coordinator in Australia and Donna Kettenbach is media coordinator in St. Louis. Public Affairs team members include M. Fredric Volkmann, Sue Killenberg McGinn, Keith Jenkins, Gerry Everding, Mary Ellen Benson, Barbara Rea, Jim Dryden, Jim Burmeister and Joe Angeles.

The Solo Spirit Web Site is created and maintained by David Butler, Brad Culberson, Galen Harrison, and Alice Marre, with help from Cyndi McKenna, Alan Norman and Eric Young.

The Balloon

The Solo Spirit balloon uses a combination of helium and hot air to fly, a design known as a Roziere balloon. The balloon envelope is 140 feet tall and 60 feet wide. It contains 550,000 cubic feet of helium plus 100,000 cubic feet of hot air. It was designed by Donald Cameron and built by Cameron Balloons Ltd, Bristol, England. It contains no engine; the balloon is powered solely by the wind. Forty tanks of fuel, a mixture of propane and ethane, hang from the outside of the capsule. This fuel is burned to heat the helium in the balloon to cause it to rise. The pilot steers the balloon by ascending or descending to catch winds blowing in the desired direction. The balloon carries the Comstock Autopilot, which can maintain the balloon at a constant altitude by using a computer to control the burners. This allows the pilot to get some sleep!

Andy Elson built the gondola to design specifications by Cameron Balloons. The gondola, an unpressurized capsule 7' long, 5-1/2' wide, and 5-1/2' high. It is a lightweight composite of Kevlar and carbon, fitted with a plastic bubble hatch on top. Lithium batteries power the electronic components inside the capsule. A pair of heaters keep the capsule interior temperature between 40 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit.

A Global Positioning System (GPS) relies on satellites to determine the balloon's precise latitude and longitude for navigation. The Inmarsat C satellite communication system is the primary means of communication between Solo Spirit and mission control, with the Inmarsat Mini M satellite telephone as a backup. High-Frequency (HF) radio is used for communication with Air Traffic Control. Very-high-frequency (VHF) radio provides air-to-air and air-to-ground communication up to 100 miles. The Solo Spirit mission team is not giving out the radio frequencies used. Finally, the balloon is equipped with an Emergency Position Indicating Rescue Beacon (EPIRB) which can be activated by the pilot to initiate an international search and rescue.

Flight Path

The balloon will be launched from Northam, Western Australia. The Solo Spirit Balloon flies with the wind. Upon a favorable trajectory forecast, Fossett will launch from West Australia and fly east over Australia. Next he will cross over the South Pacific. He will travel across Chile, Argentina and the South Atlantic Ocean. He expects to pass just south of Capetown, South Africa to the final stretch over the Indian Ocean. To succeed, he must land back in Australia at a longitude equal to or farther east than where he began his journey.

Mission Operations

While Solo Spirit is in the air, its welfare is the joint responsibility of pilot Steve Fossett and his team at mission control at Washington University in St. Louis. Mission Control is staffed around the clock by experienced balloonists and meteorologists who communicate with Fossett mainly via satellite email. The balloon's location is carefully mapped; weather systems are monitored using the latest available satellite data; and flight path alternatives are continually evaluated.

Life in the Balloon

While in the air, Fossett has to make adjustments in order to live within the limited space of the balloon gondola. In the unpressurized environment, he breathes from a mask supplied by liquid oxygen cylinders much of the time. The gondola is equipped with a bench and sleeping bag; however, he averages four hours of sleep each day in naps of no more than 45 minutes. His meals consist of military-style Meals Ready to Eat (MREs) and water. He must climb outside the capsule to change fuel tanks and maintain the burners. A bucket and a bottle substitute for restroom facilities aboard Solo Spirit.