BALLOON SPORTING EVENTS.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 88, 15 April 1899, Page 5 (Supplement)

BALLOON SPORTING EVENTS.

Some of the wealthiest society men in Paris have just founded an extraordinary club, the constitution of which reads like a chapter out of one of Jules Verne's novels. The organisation is called the Aero Club, and its object is the encouragement of aerial navigation and the inauguration of aeria! sporting events.

The members of the club want to soar above the earth. Money is no object to them, and if airships were procurable the club would purchase them. As it is, the aeroists have to content themselves with balloons. In a few months they expect to be able to telephone to headquarters any fine morning when the wind is propitious: Get balloon No. X ready for a party,' and in' a few houra the aeroists will be far above the nojses of the city and the worries of the Dreyfus affair.

Most of the members of the new club are enthusiastic devotees of the horseless carriage fad. The charter meeting has just been held in the rooms of the Automobile Club of France, and 150 members signed the constitution, which it is supposed marks an epoch in aerial navigation. One of-the club's first steps will be the erection of sheds to protect balloons, which will be always inflated and ready to set out at the. disposition of members. One of the charter members, M. Chesnay, of Dijon, has already made the club a present of a very comfortable balloon, in which he has made several ascensions. He has also presented the Aeros with an apparatus for making hydrogen. The dream of balloonists is to find a light, cheap gas. The greater ascending force the gas possesses the smaller can be the balloon, and consequently the cost of making the aerial trip. Hydrogen is a solution of the problem, but it is costly.

One.of the articles of. the Aero constitution provides for offering a prize of 1000 francs to anyone who will discover a light cheap gas. Another article relates to the granting of degrees and diplomas for proficiency in aerial navigation. It is hoped that the desire to obtain diplomas will give rise to a class of specialists in balloon ascension from whose ranks the Minister of War can obtain recruits for army balloon work. Officers here predict that in the next European war the balloon will play a prominent part on account of its power to make sport of the thickest walls of fortresses. They also predict that the balloon will be able to fight submarine boats. As for guiding balloons, the Aero Club promises to solve the problem, and the members are so wealthy and. influential that serious hopes are entertained that they will be enabled to make good their promises. The honorary president of the club is Baron. Zuylon de Nyewelt, while Count de Dion is the president, and one of the most enthusiastic members is Joseph Vailot. director of the Mount Blanc Observatory. Sporting events in the air are to be a feature of the club. Balloon races will be run under much the same conditions that govern racing with horseless carriages in France to-day. M. Blum, one of. the most enthusiastic aeroists, has already offered an aerial challenge cup, in conjunction with the proprietors of the newpaper, 'France Automobile.1 The cup is to go to hardy balloonists who will break the record for the distance travelled In one unbroken Journey in a balloon.