Posted on 09/18/2003 11:02:47 PM PDT by HAL9000
AMERICAN adventurer and businessman Steve Fossett took off today on his latest bid to set the world glider altitude record, in a flight over the snowcapped mountains of southern New Zealand.Fossett and former NASA test pilot Einar Enevoldson set off in the afternoon into mountain wave wind conditions they hope will lift their glider to heights above the current record of 14,935 metres.
If successful, the flight to the north of New Zealand's highest peak, the 3,754-metre Mount Cook, was expected to take about five hours.
The wind was expected to continue improving until midnight.
"There's the potential to get up ... around 50,000 feet (15,240 metres), in the vicinity of the altitude record,'' Fossett said from his flying base at Omarama alpine soaring field on South Island.
"We don't know that it's really that good today, but that's what we're looking for,'' he said.
If Fossett flies into the night, residents of Omarama, a tiny farming village known for its ideal gliding conditions, will congregate at the gliding field with their cars and illuminate the runway with their headlights.
Fossett and Enevoldson were flying a German-made glider and wearing NASA space suits for the record bid.
This is Fossett's second year trying to find the right gliding conditions to break the record set in 1986 by American Bob Harris. Fossett spent 19 days in New Zealand in August but the right conditions for a record bid failed to materialise.
Fossett said if the wave wind conditions improved as expected, a second record attempt could be mounted tomorrow if the pair didn't find enough lift on today's flight.
"Tomorrow might be better ... and we're well enough organised that we can turn it around and fly again tomorrow morning ... at first light,'' Fossett said.
Fossett hopes eventually to confirm that conditions in the stratosphere can lift a specially modified glider to 30,500 metres, virtually the edge of space.
In July, Fossett and New Zealand glider pilot Terry Delore broke the world gliding speed record for a 750km triangular course above the Nevada Desert.
Fossett made global headlines when he became the first to fly a hot air balloon solo around the world, landing in Outback Australia on July 4, 2002.
Omarama is a gliding centre 670km south-west of the capital, Wellington.
Fossett fails in second bid to break glider record
OMARAMA, New Zealand (AP) -- American adventurer Steve Fossett failed Saturday in his second bid in less than a day to break the glider altitude record in southern New Zealand.
Fossett and former NASA test pilot Einar Enevoldson set off shortly after daybreak to seek out wind conditions they hoped would lift their glider above the current record of 49,009 feet.
They were back on the ground an hour later, aborting the attempt after hitting "rotor wind ... which is rough and turbulent," Fossett told The Associated Press.
"We were hoping for better," said the Chicago millionaire, the first person to fly a hot air balloon solo around the world. "Even the tow plane had to drop us off early" because the wind conditions were too rough.
This second failed bid came 13 hours after Friday's attempt stalled north of New Zealand's highest peak, the 12,316-foot Mount Cook, at about 25,000 feet.
The team hopes a fresh weather pattern approaching the region may give them one last shot at the record early in the coming week.
Omarama is a gliding center on South Island, 415 miles southwest of the capital, Wellington.
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