Instrument problems force early landing
This story appeared in the Antelope Valley
Press Saturday, March 15, 2003.
CALIFORNIA CITY (AP) - The third bid by millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett
and a co-pilot to reach the stratosphere in a glider
and smash a world altitude record failed Friday when instrument problems
forced an early landing.
Fossett and retired NASA pilot Einar Enevoldson safely landed at 1:20 p.m.,
76 minutes after they took off on a flight they had hoped
would carry them above 49,009 feet, breaking a gliding record set in 1986.
A device that broadcasts the glider's altitude to airspace controllers
apparently malfunctioned, forcing the pressure suit-clad duo to abort
the flight after reaching an altitude of about 15,000 feet, Pat Seamount,
the project's chief engineer, said.
The two were expected to make a short flight later Friday to ensure the
glider's instruments were working correctly, Seamount said.
They planned a further attempt to break the record on Saturday, when weather
conditions were expected to be more favorable, she
added.
Fossett and Enevoldson made two similar attempts last summer in flights out of New Zealand but got no higher than about 30,000 feet.
"It's extremely difficult to do and any one attempt is not likely to result
in success, but we're doing it the right way and believe we are well
prepared," Fossett said early Friday in a telephone interview from California
City, 25 miles north of Lancaster in the Mojave Desert.
The plan calls for Fossett and Enevoldson, tucked inside the Perlan, their
German-built, 75-foot wingspan glider, to be towed to 7,000
feet and released.
They then plan to fly back and forth between the Mojave Desert and 14,495-foot Mount Whitney in the Sierra Nevada.
That would allow them to surf a wave of rapidly rising air created when
the jet stream bumps up against the Sierra. The flight should take
four to six hours.
"It's going to be spectacular up there," Fossett said.
Fossett already has set glider speed-for-distance records. He is best known
for making the first solo round-the-world flight in a balloon,
which he completed in July on his sixth attempt.
Fossett, 58, and Enevoldson, 70, plan to return to New Zealand in June
or July and attempt to glide to 62,000 feet, the highest altitude
the Perlan could theoretically reach, Fossett said.
Fossett did not disclose the cost of the Perlan project, underwritten in
part by beer and video game companies. The glider is named for a
restaurant in Iceland.
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