General Ballooning Information

A Brief History of Ballooning (courtesy of the Balloon Museum in Albuquerque, NM website)

• September 19th, 1783 – The first hot air balloon was launched by a French scientist named Pilatre De Rozier and was called “Aerostat Reveillon.” The balloon carried 3 passengers—a rooster, a duck, and a sheep— and was only in the air for 15 minutes before crashing back to the ground. 

• November 21st, 1783 – Just two months later, 2 French brothers—Joseph and Etienne Montgolfier—attempted the first manned flight. They launched their balloon in Paris and the flight lasted 20 minutes, birthing hot air ballooning.

• 1785 – Jean Pierre Blanchard, a French balloonist, and John Jefferies, his American co-pilot, became the first people to ever fly a gas balloon across the English Channel. This marked one of the longest distances a balloon had ever flown and was a major step toward long-distance balloon travel.

• That same year, Pilatre De Rozier (the world’s first balloonist), died while also trying to cross the English Channel. His balloon exploded shortly after take-off on account of his experimental design of using a hot air balloon and a hydrogen balloon tied together.

• January 7th, 1793 – Jean Pierre Blanchard becomes the first person to fly a hot air balloon in North America, with President George Washington watching the launch.

• For the next 150 years, hot air ballooning was overtaken by gas ballooning and the practice of flying via hot air balloon was all but abandoned.

• 1950s – A man named Ed Yost worked to revive hot air ballooning by engineering a redesigned fueling system that would allow balloons to fly for longer distances and become more maneuverable.

• October 22, 1960 – Ed Yost launched the first modern hot air balloon flight in Bruning, Nebraska, which lasted for 1 hour and 35 minutes.

• 1972 – Sid Cutter organized a gathering of 13 balloons in Albuquerque, New Mexico. This event would go on to become the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta, the largest balloon event in the world. 

• 1987 – Richard Branson and Per Lindstrand became the first people in history to cross the Atlantic in a hot air balloon, flying 2,900 miles in 33 hours.

1991 – Branson and Lindstrand re-teamed to cross the Pacific in a hot air balloon. Their flight launched from Japan and traveled to Canada, flying 6,700 miles in 47 hours.