Balloonists in trans-Atlantic race must have patience, persistence

Briefing 4, Week 3 for the teams in the trans-Atlantic balloon race was notable for its brevity.

At 8:45 a.m. Wednesday, the fax in the command center spewed updated weather information from the team of meteorologists in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

By 9 a.m., half the contingent of racers had gathered for the briefing in the pool-side hotel room. They waited a bit while stragglers returned from an early morning hot-air balloon flight. To kill time they loosely organized an assembly line to sign posters and T-shirts for one another.

About 9:10 a.m. after everyone crowded into the room, the local weather expert for the race started the briefing. Don Cameron searched a scattered pile of papers for the latest fax from Rotterdam and read it.

“The general situation has not changed since yesterday. An upper trough over the western Atlantic is deepening and shifting only slowly to the east. At the west flank of this, trajectories take a course too far to the south,” he said.

Were the balloons to lift off in the next day or two, the winds would carry them down the Atlantic Ocean, said Alan Noble, race director. It is doubtful they would make landfall in Africa.

With the weather uncooperative, the crews have a few days off. As long as one member of each team attends the daily briefings, Noble said, the others are free to leave town on overnight trips provided they stay in touch.

At 9:15 a.m., the forecast dispensed with, Noble raised some housekeeping matters. He reminded those assembled to stay current with their miscellaneous bills at the hotel and to have their friends and family obtain proper credentials if they plan to head out to the airport to look over the race equipment.

In the past three days, plans for the race have changed several times. What started Monday as a low probability of liftoff Wednesday morning, later in the day turned into a good chance. Tuesday morning the planned launch was scrubbed, with a slight hope held out that it would happen. Tuesday afternoon it was postponed all together.

One racer has monitored the effects of the on-again, off-again status. Bertrand Piccard of the Belgium team is a psychiatrist who also flies hang gliders and utlralight aircraft.

All of the racers appear to have coped well with the changes, avoiding emotional swings. Stress and heightened excitement force the body to work harder; acidity builds in the stomach and muscles grow tense.

“You can get tired using energy for nothing,” Piccard said. On the other end an emotional letdown can set in after a state of high anticipation.

“You don’t have enough possibility to be ready to do good things,” Piccard said. “You feel you don’t have the energy. It’s very important to avoid the extremes.”

Casting a clinical eye on fellow racers, he said, “I am impressed that they are almost all like this, in the middle. Almost all the people here have been involved in aeronautical experiences for a very long time. They are used to it.”

With the morning briefing out of the way, the teams set out on separate paths. Some of the groups wound up at the airport, working on their gondolas and clowning around for a Belgian camera crew.

Rob Bayly, one of the British pilots, showed off an adapted piece of equipment that will permit them to indulge a typically British passion — tea.

The propane burners will be fired at night to heat the helium and maintain lift. The pilot light will be on all night.

Spotting a tea kettle in a local store, Bayly figured it would be just the ticket. He hammered in the bottom so the kettle fits perfectly atop the burner.

For the film crew he lit the pilot light and placed the kettle up top. He reckoned that in less than 15 minutes, the heat from the pilot light would boil enough water for four cups of tea.

Should Bayly and fellow pilot Don Cameron feel the need for more of the comforts of home, they packed some biscuits to accompany the tea.

It may not provide the comfort of a cup of tea, but Piccard displayed something he will not fly without.

“Just after I was invited to participate in the race I was in China,” he said. After touring an antiquities museum he stopped in the store.

“I saw this,” he said, opening his hand to reveal a talisman. The brass object, from the dynasty of the last emperor, was about 3 1/2 inches across with a hole in the middle and Chinese writing on both sides.

“I asked them what it meant,” he said. A loose translation of the inscription is, “When the wind has the same direction as your path it gives you great happiness.”

Piccard paused for a minute. “I thought it was impossible not to have it. It will be here for the flight,” he said patting the pocket over his heart.