First hand balloon observations

[clipper1801]

Whilst sifting through piles of boxes of aviation magazines I stumbled onto this gem. June 1976 Aeroplane Monthly features F. Russell Sadd's description of his training and flights in 1915 for the RNAS. Quite interesting . . .

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What an adventure, and his description is so humble, he must have been scared to death! Sorry the rotation daemons were lurking . . . interesting technical details . . .

[gully_raker]

Nice find David.

[abovetheclouds]

Thanks David for posting this article. It was absolutely fascinating to read a first-hand account by someone who had lived through this extraordinary experience. I like that he mentioned after his first solo training mission when people had gathered around to assist him, that he made certain that no one was smoking before deflating his hydrogen filled balloon. A nice, and very important detail.

[clipper1801]

I liked the part where they had to remove one of the 4 wheels of the truck to run the steam powered winch cable!

[clipper1801]

Yikes! Just found another box of vintage AERO PLANE mags . . . good thing I just have the next month to sift and sort them . . .

[camelbeagle]

Very interesting!