Joseph Michel Montgolfier
and Jacques Etienne Montgolfier, two brothers from Annonay, France,
constructed an air balloon that was lifted by lighting a cauldron
of paper beneath it, and therefore heating and rarifying the air
it contained. On 4th June, 1782, this hot air balloon reached a
height of about 6,560 feet (2,000 m).
The brothers now moved
to Paris and on 19th September, 1782, their balloon carried a sheep,
a goose and a rooster. The following year the Montgolfier brothers
managed to persuade Pilâtre de Rozier and the Marquis d'Arlandes
to became the first people to take part in a manned balloon flight.
In November, 1783, the two men travelled 7 miles (12.1 km) in less
than half an hour at the height of 3,000 feet (915 m).
Jacques Alexandre Charles,
a member of the French Academy of Science, watched these experiments
with great interest. He developed his own air balloon. However,
he replaced hot air with hydrogen. After a long flight in November,
1783, it came down near Paris where it was destroyed by some frightened
local men.
The following month a
new balloon made by Jacques Alexandre Charles carried its inventor
and another man a distance of 27 miles (43 km).
Pilâtre de Rozier
now decided to make his own balloon that contained both hot air
and hydrogen. On 15th June, 1785, Rozier and a friend, Pierre Romain,
decided to fly from Boulogne to England. At an altitude of about
2,950 feet (900 m) the hydrogen, expanded by the hot air, exploded
and the two men were killed. They were the first men to lose their
lives in a manned flight.
