Balloon man..........

[Rhona]

Does anyone know whatever happened to that priest who took a balloon flight for charity and just dissapeared - I think he took off with a load of helium balloons and then nothing..........

[SandyB]

That still remains a mystery  ,, maybe  he did the Icarus thing ... as the wax on the wings melted as he got closer to the sun  so did the ballons pop as altitude got higher  ??

[Mike Stenson (RIP)]

Was on the news a couple of weeks ago......found floating in the sea with his balloons...dead.

[Michael Alexander]

That was in Brazil.......   

[Michael Alexander]

What did he die from? Drowning? Altitude Sickness?

[Mike Stenson (RIP)]

Two priests ?

[SandyB]

Two Priests ... ??

[Rhona]

Had his balloons popped?

[barb (Fry)]

I'm told by my educated friends that Helium expands the higher the altitude so the balloons would definitely POP and then he'd fall....... fast !
He obviously didn't do his science homework.

[Rhona]

Oh my......so that is what happened to our priest

[SandyB]

Unfortunately from  " nearer my god to thee " it changed into a  dive of obviously awful  proportions  and consequences ...  why did nobody in the know stop him ??

[Michael Alexander]

A flying priest....are they allowed to do that? I thought that was reserved for the angels?

[Diana Rudd (Boehme)]

Oh Blessed be He....

[barb (Fry)]

Well my apologies, my even more educated friend Google has informed me that cluster ballooning is a eccentric extreme sport - not many followers due to the difficulty the "pilot" has with control.
Anyway the priest is still missing although his cluster of balloons where found in the ocean. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7360416.stm

Links for interested parties  http://www.clusterballoon.org/

[Dalene Steenkamp (Coetzee)]

Sort of the same story was on Discovery some time ago  -  a guy from a small town somewhere in the state of Tennessee took off in a garden chair  -  elevated out of sight.  About an hour later a Boeing 747 pilot that was dropping in altitude to go in for the landing at a nearby big city airport, radio'd the controll tower to rapport that at 4000 ft they had just passed a guy on a garden chair with a lot of balloons tied to it and this bloke still waved at them...  He had a BB gun with him and shot at the balloons  -  later found him still in his chair  -  well and alive, entangled in some telephone or electic cables  (he had caused a power-out and was charged for that!)