Balloonists savour Atlantic triumph

Press, 19 August 1978, Page 9

Balloonists savour Atlantic triumph

NZPA-Reuter Paris three American fliers yesterday savoured | :ien triumph in successfully completing the I Xtl 11 ee ’^ oa^n I? balloon flight across the |

Assured of a place ir aviation history and feted bj huge crowds after theii landing in France on Thursday night (yesterday morning N.Z. time), the aviators gave top priority to getting a good night’s rest. Unshaven and visibly tired after the six-day voyage, they landed their craft, Double Eagle Two, in a wheatfield near Evreux, west of Paris. Ben Abruzzo, aged 48. Max Anderson, aged 44, and Larry Newman, aged 31, all of Albuquerque. New Mexico, had taken off from Presque Isle, Maine, last Frida v.

They had hoped to follow the path of Charles Lind bergh, the American pilot who in 1927 was the first to cross the Atlantic solo in a motor-driven aircraft, and land as he did at Le Bourget Airport, north of Paris. But unfavourable winds and approaching nightfall prevented them from reaching the airport. They came down instead near the village of Miserey, 90km from Paris. The population of the village ran to welcome the three balloonists who celebrated their success by uncorking a bottle of champagne they had taken on their flight. They were first taken by helicopter to Paris for a reunion with their wives nt the American Embassy. The three men said they felt slightly disappointed not to have reached Le Bourget Airport as Lindbergh did. “This was the destination we set out to reach when we took off from Presque Isle, but the wind and the sunset eventually forced us to cut short our voyage.” Ben Abruzzo told reporters. Asked why they had been successful where many others before had failed, he said: “We tried once before. That experience made all the difference in the world.” Abruzzo and Anderson failed in a previous Atlantic balloon crossing a year ago. Ben Abruzzo added he had taken off with total confidence because the trip was well organised and well planned. “The calculations, the design, the logic were all there and all we had to do was to fly correctly,” he said. He said that the weather had been very favourable, but that they" had suffered from the high altitude. The American Embassy

dfered one of the balloonsts the bed where Lindbergh dept the first night after his Atlantic crossing 51 years ago. "We tossed for the bed oetween us before landing and Larry won,” Max Anderson said. But he added, “It is a single bed and I think Larry would rather have a double bed to keep his wife with him.” Asked what were his plans now, Anderson said "To sleep a lot.” Although the balloonists crossed by the slowest airborne means, they were promised a return home at faster than the speed of sound — in free seats aboard an Air France supersonic Concorde airliner. The three adventurers are their balding leader, Abr uzzo. Friends and family remember the young Abruzzo as having an insatiable love for death-defying feats. He was. they said, "quite daring." “As a boy of 12 or 13, he swan-dived off the bridge in the centre of town (Rockford, Illinois),” said his sister, Maris Turiciano. "As a student (at the University of Illinois), he was dared to jump out of a sec-ond-storey window in a dorm. So he did it.” As an Albuquerque, New Mexico, businessman, he inevitably was drawn to Max Anderson, who shared a love of adventure as strong as Abruzzos. The third member of the team — Larry Newman — is a hangglider pilot and told reporters before leaving, “I do something a little crazy every day.” Before the trip Newman had been in a baloon only once, but the other pair said that his inexperience did not matter. They added him to the team to lower their fatigue, a key factor to success. they had been convinced by their previous trip. Abruzzo, like his companions, also is an astute businessman. He said that the flight would cost about $125,000, which is what the unsuccessful flight last year cost. “But.” he said, “we probably will make money if we're successful or if we have a very long flight,” adding that the three men had formed a corporation to make money on book and film rights to the flight.