Indian Tycoon Sets Balloon Flight Record

GillBates0 writes "The BBC is reporting that Vijaypat Singhania, a textile tycoon, has set a new world record for the highest hot air balloon flight. The 67-year-old took off from Mumbai, India in a 48m(160ft) balloon and flew to a height of 21,290m (69,852ft) breaking the earlier record of 19,811m(64,997ft)."

Live Videos of the flight

[parryFromIndia]

The project was called Mission Impossible 70K (MI70K) and there are some live videos detailing his flight (Flash required) on this site - http://www.mi70k.com/video.htm [mi70k.com]. The site also carries information about Mr. Singhania and his some other records.

Mission Impossible 70k

[vivekg]

Watch Singhania's attempt the world record breaking feat-Live! For latest updates here [mi70k.com] including record update.

perspecive...

[3-State Bit]

The 67-year-old took off from Mumbai, India in a 48m(160ft) balloon and flew to a height of 21,290m (69,852ft [= 13.22 miles]) breaking the earlier record of 19,811m(64,997ft [=12.31 miles]).

A very good source for some perspective is this Wikipedia page on atmospheric heights [wikipedia.org]. Note that the troposphere (illustrated nicely with Mt. Everest just jutting into it, an airplane flying in this layer) only extends up to 17 km (at the equator, lowers as you near the poles - the figure at the right in the Wikipedia page is in miles though, so be careful) -- this guy flew well above that (21 km).

So this guy is in the stratosphere, where we see only weather balloons illustrated. The layer above (mesosphere, from about 50 km on) is practically space, it's apparently where meteors burn up. So I guess this guy reached the high stratosphere - for comparison check out that Mount Everest [wikipedia.org] is at 8.84 km elevation!

It's no wonder, then, that from the article (which I actually read, just for you) :
He travelled in a pressurised cabin attached to a balloon as high as a 22-storey building.
This "pressurized cabin" is just mentioned once more, in this "quick facts" table:

BALLOON FACTS AND FIGURES.

• Current record: 64,997ft (19,811m)
• Target altitude: 70,000ft (21,336m)
• Balloon capacity: 1.6m cu ft
• Total height: 160ft (48.8m)
• Gross weight: 1,820kg (1.8 tons)
• Pilot flies in 560kg sealed aluminium capsule approx 2.7m x 1.4m (9ft x 4ft 6in)
• Fitted with 18 burners, three fuel tanks, sat-phone; camera; two VHF radios; GPS; life-support system; safety-release system and parachute
  Ascent: 3 hours
• Descent: 1.5-2 hours

whoops, sorry, there's once more mention of this enclosure, here are a couple of more paragraphs quoted for you, the appropriate text in bold):

Mr Singhania's craft comprised a pressurised aluminium capsule with a specially designed multi-coloured balloon and 18 burners.

The balloon was connected to a parachute that would have been released automatically in case of any emergency.

A helicopter carrying a technical team followed the balloon closely and was in constant touch with Mr Singhania throughout the flight.

And what the hell, there's so little I didn't reproduce, you might as well have a mirror. (Although I find only the following other fact interesting: "During the ascent, air temperatures plummeted to around -93C (-135F)." And maybe a quote from his wife Asha telling of her relief and joy at the success of the trip: "When I heard that he had broken the record, I became numb in mind and heart". I'm sure there's a funny to be made about that.)

CAREFUL, THERE IS NOTHING ELSE INTERESTING BELOW!!

ARTICLE TEXT (with markup)

-------------
INDIAN SETS BALLOON FLIGHT RECORD

Mr Singhania's 160ft high balloon took off from a site near Mumbai
Indian Vijaypat Singhania has claimed a new world record for the highest flight in a hot air balloon, after a voyage lasting several hours.

The 67-year-old textile tycoon soared past 21,000 metres (69,000 feet) but fell just short of his original target.

He travelled in a pressurised cabin attached to a balloon as high as a 22-storey building.

The previous record of 19,811 metres (64,997 feet) was set by Per Lindstrand in Plano, Texas, in June 1988.

Mr Singhania's son, Gautam, announced the news to the waiting media.

He said: "As you can see we are very happy. The team is also excited because they have worked very hard on this project for a very long time."

Colin Prescott, leader of Mr Singhania's British technical te

Re:What's the point?

[NineNine]

I don't know. What's the point of plugging in 1000 Linux computers together? What's the point of lighting in PC's? What's the point of MySQL? What's the point of the iPod? This, at least, was a scientific/engineering achievement.

Re:What's the point?

[Mignon]

What's the point of plugging in 1000 Linux computers together?
Cost-effective way to solve some highly-parallelizable computing problems.

What's the point of MySQL?
Open-source, easy to use database. Well integrated with PHP for web applications.

What's the point of the iPod?
Attractive, easy-to-use, portable music player. Integrates well with ITMS.

What's the point of lighting in PC's?
I'm still trying to figure this one out.

Yawn!

[utexaspunk]

How is this impressive, when Joe Kittinger [balloonlife.com] rode a balloon up to 102,800 feet (31.3km) and then parachuted out of it, breaking the speed of sound with just his body?

Helium != Hot Air

[Anonymous Coward]

As such.