The world “race” almost invariably implies time—covering some distance or doing something in a certain time. Balloon races, however, are different. They are for distance—straight line (great circle) distance between the place of departure and the landing place, wholly regardless of actual route distance over the ground, and regardless of elapsed time.
While ballooning is one of the oldest present-day sports, having been practiced for the past 150 years, the International Gordon Bennett “classic” dates only from 1906. In that year James Gordon Bennett posted the trophy, to be completed for by international teams annually. Three consecutive victories by one nation are necessary to gain permanent possession of the cup. The original cup survived until 1924, when Captain Ernest deMuyter, with a third consecutive victory, gained permanent possession of it for Belgium. The Aero Club of Belgium immediately posted a second cup, which did not last long, being retired by three United States victories—van Orman in 1926, Hill in 1927, and Kepnet in 1928. A group in Detroit then posted the Third Gordon Bennett Cup and van Orman proceeded to capture the first two “legs” for the United States by victories in 1929 and 1930. For economic reasons no race was held in 1931, and in 1932 the race was passed back to Europe, although the rule had been that it would take place in the country of the winner of the previous year. Basel, Switzerland, was chosen as the locality for departure, September 25, 1932, as the date.
Sixteen balloons representing eight nations, France; Germany, Poland, Austria, Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, and the United States, were entered. The two American balloons were; Goodyear VIII, van Orman and Blair; and U.S. Navy, Settle and Bushnell.
During the day of Sunday, the twenty- fifth, the inflation of the balloonsproceeded without incident at a roomy field alongside the new gas works of the city of Basel, just a few hundred yards from the German frontier. Ordinary coal gas was piped to each of the sixteen 80,000 cubic-foot balloons. A detachment of Swiss balloon troops, with one or more officers, was assigned to the pilot of each balloon, to comprise the required “man power” during the inflation and rigging of the balloon. These balloon troops and all of the other technical arrangements were most efficient. Contrary to the past general practice in this country, the technical committees were composed of men with previous ballooning experience.
During the day the wind was light southwesterly on the surface, fresh southwesterly aloft, with scattered strato-cumulus clouds and rain showers. Dr. Eckener of Luftschiffbau-Zeppelin had very courteously arranged to have a number of upper air soundings taken at Friedrichshafen on the day preceding, and on the day of the race. These soundings were transmitted by telegraph to the navy balloon, decoded and passed on to the three German balloons and the Goodyear VIII, and were of very great assistance.
At last, toward late afternoon, the navy balloon was all rigged and “ready to get under way.” A preliminary “weigh-off” was taken, flowers presented, wives and sponsors kissed (much to the enjoyment of our ground crew, as well as ourselves); at last, when ten balloons were already off, it was our turn; we were walked up to the take-off position, given a final weigh-off by the official in charge, and at 4:40 p.m. we were off.
Now at the beginning of the story of the race itself, let me warn the reader not to expect a thrilling narrative of hairbreadth escapes from the infuriated elements; it so happened that the voyage of the U. S. Navy in this race was an “easy-going,” pleasant, routine-type, balloon hop, without any “heavy weather,” and devoid of thrills and “adventures.”
We had gotten off with 47 bags of sand ballast (about 35 lb. each), and several hundred pounds of disposable equipment. I ballasted rather freely and went right up to 5,000 ft., a little above the strato- cumulus base level. There was a rain squall 15 miles southwest of Basel. The beautiful Rhine Valley stretched away to the eastward, and to the northward, around the “corner” at Basel; we were over the southern edge of the great Black Forest. However, Bushnell and I had other things to think and worry about than the landscape below us. There was a heavy cumulo-nimbus in the northwest and another a little on our “port bow.” We were making good a course about northeast by east at a speed of about 20 knots. As darkness came on we had to continue dumping our precious sand ballast over the side to compensate for the cooling of the gas; we could see lightning in the Alps, far to the southward across the western end of Lake Constance, and the thunderstorm to the northeastward was “banging away” ferociously, fortunately, the storm was only a psychological hazard, since as time went on, it diverged from our course, drew aft on our port hand, and towards morning, drew out of sight.
Up until 2:00 a.m. we stayed in the stratum 5,000-8,000 ft. above sea level. The air was smooth, except when an occasional patch of alto-cumulus cloud would overrun us and we would get a few mild kicks from it. We sighted the lights of other balloons from time to time, and on two occasions some balloon fired two colored stars (Very pistol)—for what purpose is not known.
About 2:00 a.m. the lapse rate in our stratum has increased to a point where the balloon was unstable, and wanted to “gallop” up and down. So we came down into the stratum 2,000-3,500 ft. and stayed there until daylight. Here we made a course about northeast.
At daylight we were “crossing astern” of a rain squall to the eastward of us; we had recently been in very mild showers several times, a fine mist having negligible ballast effect. We were over hilly country in Czechoslovakia. A couple of hours later we slid over the highest ridge at 5,000 ft., and had the broad, flat, and cultivated plains of Poland ahead of us. There were several other balloons in sight, too far away for identification.
As the sun’s heat became more and more potent in warming up our gas during the forenoon, I let the balloon rise, valving freely to cut the rate of ascent to a minimum. By 11:00 a.m. we were at 10,000 ft. About this time we discovered that we had a rather serious accident; the lower temperatures at these altitudes made me crave a “shot” of hot chocolate, of which we had brought along a full thermos bottle. In searching for the thermos bottle in my duffle bag, I found that it had exploded presumably from the lowered external pressure, and had very efficiently distributed all of our hot chocolate over my spare white shirt, underclothes, and socks, all of which were soaked—served me right for bringing along spare clothes, which is really unethical in balloon racing. Later on, naturally, we used my chocolate—soaked clothes for ballast. The natives finding them must have thought that these balloonists are truly peculiar people.
By 2:30 p.m. we were up to 15,000 ft., our maximum altitude on this hop. The clouds, of course, had been growing “tall,” convectional turbulence was increasing rapidly and we were getting occasional flurries of very fine snow. Decision had to be made then between two courses of action: (1) to go high, probably to 25,000 ft., and make a short-time, high-speed run, with certainty of having to land shortly after dark, or (2) to come down on my dragrope and conserve ballast, with the prospect of being able to go through the second night, and thus make a slower-speed, longer-time run. I made the latter decision. It was excellent dragroping country. For any reader who may not know, a dragrope is a length of manila line, 200-250 ft. long, weighing 30-50 lb., hanging from the balloon basket. When running along with any part of this line dragging on the surface, one is said to be “drag-roping.” If the balloon descends further, more of the line is put on the ground and corresponding weight taken off the balloon, and vice versa. The dragrope is, in this way, automatic ballast; dragroping is a means of conserving ballast under turbulent air conditions.
On this Monday afternoon, September 26, the U. S. Navy was dragroping over the plains of Poland, at about 18-20 knots’ speed, scaring the wits out of the chickens and cows, occasionally hauling the dragrope over the thatched roof of a peasant house with a loud hum and a final “crack” as the end of the line would whip around some post or corner and then come clear. Luckily for the telephone and telegraph lines, there were not many of them, because they are often subject to quite a bit of “wear and tear” from dragropes. Apparently the Polish horses are not air-minded—at least not balloon-minded; they would see us a long way off and start rearing and bucking. The girls all ran for the houses; Bush said, “they see the Navy coming.” A few peasants grabbed our line but couldn’t hang on with our speed. We yelled at them to leave it alone and the more we yelled the more they would try to get it—dumb people in this part of Poland—couldn’t seem to understand our Polish. In the late afternoon a Polish airplane came along and circled us close aboard—too close for our comfort—for we were afraid he would get his whiskers fouled in our rigging. We were now approaching Warsaw. It is usually inexpedient to dragrope over a city—you are liable to topple over some chimneys and make people sore. So we heaved overboard the exploded thermos bottle and a couple of cans of beans (emergency rations), and jumped up to 8,000 ft. to clear the city—not meaning to imply that there are any chimneys there that high. We crossed the outskirts of Warsaw and the Vistula River, and came down onto our dragrope again on the other side.
The sun was low now, and fast losing its “pep”; and we were likewise losing most of our disposable equipment, with the cooling and contraction of our gas. We were jettisoning equipment in order to save our sand ballast for unknown future vicissitudes, but Mike Nowinsky, American newspaper correspondent in Warsaw, thought that we must be on our “last legs” and chased us in his car for 70 kilometers. About 9:00 p.m., the air had smoothed out and we had “settled down” for the night, with six bags of ballast and probably 50 pounds of disposable equipment left on board. We got up off the dragrope, and explored up to 10,000 feet. The rest of the night we maintained various altitudes between 2,000 and 8,000 feet. The air was smooth, sky clear except for occasional patches of diminishing strato-cumulus, and nothing to worry us except a distant thunderstorm in the northeast, which later in the night hauled off or subsided.
The first night we had got practically no sleep, but the second night each of us got several hours, which seemed like three times that much. Bush and I stood “watch and watch”—one of us on watch and the other “turned in” on a sandbag in a corner of the basket. The one turned in would snore loudly enough to keep the “watch” awake; and after awhile, between the sandbag getting harder and the snoring getting louder, he would wake himself up and “relieve the watch.” By morning we were as fit and fresh as when we had got under way.
Shortly after sunrise we were a few miles southeast of Vilna, the ancient capital of the Lithuanians, but now the chief city of one of the departments of Poland. We let the balloon be sucked up slowly by the sun, much as on the previous morning. By nine o’clock, however, the clouds (s-cu) had grown to such an extent that I would have had to go to imprudent altitudes (considering present shortage of ballast) to keep “in the sun.” So we let her drop from 5,500 ft. down to her dragrope again. This country was more sparsely populated and somewhat more hilly than we had been over the previous afternoon; one cow who was staked out in a pasture pulled up her stake and ran for her life when she saw the U. S. Navy coming. The land was wet and green from recent rains and the tree tops were “soft” to drag through.
As ten o’clock approached there appeared a body of water ahead—lake or “bulged” river—and apparently a wholly forested area beyond. The surface air while still good (averaging 15 knots, SSW.) was increasing in velocity and gustiness rapidly. And with only landing ballast remaining on board, we decided that we were finished, and picked out a green pasture near a road, valved the balloon down into it, peasants hanging on to the dragrope, then pulled the rip panel out to expedite deflation.
Thus ended a pleasant and uneventful balloon hop, with a landing in practically perfect conditions.
After landing.—We had landed 0.5 kilometer south of Daugieliszki, Poland, about 1,550 kilometers (great circle) from Basel, time under way 41 hours, 20 minutes. The natives who gathered were very friendly and turned to with a will in helping us roll up the balloon. One of them had lived in Chicago for thirteen years; he knew about thirteen words of English, which were of great help, however, since these natives didn’t understand our Polish. We got the balloon loaded on to two native wagons very expeditiously, filed the necessary telegrams reporting landing in Daugielszki, then started for Ignalino, a railroad town 12 kilometers away. The road surface was too rough to permit us to ride on the iron-tired wagons without hazard to our dental work, so Bush and I walked. One of our wagons suffered a broken wheel, and our squadron had to lay to for an hour awaiting a new wheel. Then a Polish army caravan came along and took our balloon from the stranded wagon. We finally arrived in Ignalino in the late afternoon and were met by Kapitain Marjan Glut, commanding officer of the local Polish frontier guard garrison (the Lithuanian frontier is only a few kilometers away). Captain Glut had his soldiers spread out our balloon and make it up for shipment, and he then took us to his quarters where he and his wife extended the utmost of hospitality and courtesy to us until our departure, twenty-four hours later.
Analysis of race.—The two American balloon, U.S. Navy and Goodyear VIII, were the best balloons in the race from the point of view of material—lightness and low diffusion rates—and therefore should have placed first and second, as they did. As between these two American balloons it was a matter of “breaks.” The Goodyear balloon was unfortunate enough to get into heavy weather, a thunderstorm during the first night, and was consequently forced to land about 9:00 p.m., Monday, near Kaunas, Lithuania, some 194 kilometers short of the navy balloon, while the navy balloon was lucky enough to have fine weather in the immediate vicinity during the whole voyage, and was able, therefore, to go through the second night and into the following forenoon. It is noteworthy that in this race, several other balloon made higher speed while under way than did the winner. On the other hand, many races have been won by a relatively short-time, high-speed run.
The future.—This last paragraph is intended to be a plea to keep the fine sport of balloon racing alive in this country. There is no danger of it lagging in Europe, where there is great public interest and enthusiasm for ballooning. But, frankly, it has seemed to this writer, that in recent years the American public’s interest in ballooning has been allowed to lag to a degree endangering its existence as a sport here. At the present time we produce the best performing racing balloons in the world. This is largely the result of the Navy’s fostering of the airship building industry here during the past ten years, and the attendant progressive development and perfection of gas cell and other airship fabrics. And the excellence of our balloons, in a material sense, has been a large factor in the six consecutive American victories in the Gordon Bennett classic. However, it is not to be expected that we will indefinitely retain our “margin” in material, and with relative reduction of the material factor, experience and skill of pilots assume greater importance. The waning public interest and support of ballooning here is surely not conducive to general ballooning activity—local clubs and races as in Europe—which alone can constitute the soil in which to “grow” pilots of experience and skill. The 1932 Gordon Bennett victory brings the third cup permanently to this country. It is to be expected that some individual or group of individuals in this country will promptly donate a fourth Gordon Bennett cup, and that this splendid sporting classic will thereby be kept alive.