Everything about Gas Balloon totally explained
A
gas balloon is any
balloon that stays aloft due to being filled with a gas less dense than air or
lighter than air (such as
helium or
hydrogen). A gas balloon may also be called a
Charlière for its inventor, the Frenchman
Jacques Charles. Today, familiar gas balloons include large
blimps and small rubber party balloons. Blimps have displaced
zeppelins (which are not balloons) as the dominant form of
airship.
History
The first gas balloon made its flight in August 1783. It carried no passengers or cargo, and popped when it reached too high an altitude. Later that same year, (
1 December,
1783) a manned flight was made shortly after the first ascension in a
hot air balloon (and indeed the first recorded ascension by man in any flying device).
Gas balloons remained popular throughout the age before powered flight. They could fly higher and further than hot-air balloons, but were more dangerous as they were usually filled with hydrogen gas (which, unlike helium, could be easily mass-manufactured). Gas balloons were used in the
American Civil War, the
Napoleonic Wars (to very limited extent), and throughout the 19th century by hobbyists and show performers such as the
Blanchards.
Curiously, after flying to an altitude of over 3000 m on his first flight, Professor Charles never flew again.
Records
The altitude record for a manned balloon was set at 34.7 kilometers on
April 5,
1961 by
Malcolm Ross and
Victor Prather in a balloon launched from the deck of the
USS Antietam in the
Gulf of Mexico.
The altitude record for an unmanned balloon is 53.0 kilometres. It was reached by a Fujikura balloon with a volume of 60 thousand cubic metres, launched in May 2002 from
Sanriku,
Iwate, Japan. This is the greatest height ever obtained by an atmospheric vehicle. Only
rockets,
rocket planes, and
ballistic projectiles have flown higher.
On other planets
The
Russian
space probes
Vega 1 and
Vega 2 each dropped a helium balloon with scientific experiments into the
atmosphere of Venus in
1985. The balloons first
entered the atmosphere and descended to about 50
km, then inflated for level flight. Otherwise the flight was uncontrolled. Each balloon relayed wind and atmospheric conditions for 46 hours of a possible 60 hour
electric battery power budget.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Gas Balloon'.
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