I so want to do this :)
Do it then!
Man flies over South Africa in a chair tied to helium balloons [video]
41–50 of 55 posts
Re: Man flies over South Africa in a chair tied to helium balloons [video]
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Darwin Award Making fun of people dying. Fucking sick stuff. It's also logically crap. Often it's people (as in this case) doing things outside the normal. Things as hackers we should celebrate. It's also often people in extreme poverty just trying to make a living, aka the fucking sick part that we as rich educated people make fun of cause we don't have to do dirty things like recycle metal from unexploded ordnanc…
And they don't check their sources. Several of the most popular "awards" from the early years were fake, e.g. the "JATO rocket strapped to pickup" thing.
Or perhaps based upon a kernel of truth?
Re: Man flies over South Africa in a chair tied to helium balloons [video]
#43Launching high-altitude helium balloons has been the activity some friends and I do for fun. Over the course of 2 years+ we've been doing this, we had over a dozen of successful launches where we could retrieve the payload. For kids, this is a great inspiration and educational opportunity, especially for those who are interested in technology and programming. We used Arduinos and Raspberry pis in many components of t…
How difficult would it be to launch a paraplegic little person that wronged me?
Re: Man flies over South Africa in a chair tied to helium balloons [video]
#44this isn't inspired by the movie "Up." July 2, 1982 Larry Walters tied his lawn chair to balloons and carried an air pistol to shoot balloons to control the amount of lift. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Walters
When he landed his quote to the press before his arrest was:
"It was something I had to do. I had this dream for twenty years, and if I hadn't done it, I think I would have ended up in the funny farm."
This is called Cluster Ballooning: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cluster_ballooning
Guinness Book of World Records even has a category. I told my Dad I wanted to do it and he almost grounded me right then and there.
Re: Man flies over South Africa in a chair tied to helium balloons [video]
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree we should respect people and no mock them for making mistakes that they pay the ultimate price for. It doesn't matter that they're doing it for fun instead of some desperate survival need. Early aviators gave us aeroplanes and balloons by taking foolish risks and many died, but we glorify a few survivors because of their important contributions. For some reason, many kinds of deaths are protected from mockery…
The problem is that some people are engaging in needlessly risky activities, they then put the people that rescue them at risk. For example, in the UK we regularly have people rescued from mountains who are woefully ill equipped, like this guy: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-north-west-wales-41306122 Yet properly equipped mountaineers can get unlucky and die anyway. The difference between death by hypothermia bec…
It's become a sort of joke in croatia, tourists in flip-flops trying to hike into mountains (famous stereotype is of czech tourists), and currently the rescue by HGSS (mountain rescue) is free of charge, and they often have to deploy a military helicopter (they don't have their own), which is costing the tax payers a pretty penny. The rescuers are mostly volunteers.
Examples of irresponsible behavior : http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-368792...
https://www.lonelyplanet.com/news/2017/08/08/croatian-mounta...
Re: Man flies over South Africa in a chair tied to helium balloons [video]
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
I assume they are "the people who makes these flights".
Well, smarty pants, who are these numerous persons who flew in their lawn chairs strapped to helium balloons to 15K feet? There must be heaps of them since they manage to keep ChuckMcM in a state of constant amazement.
If you followed the Wikipedia link there were 5 imitators listed, and the current story makes 6. These are the ones that got enough coverage to warrant an entry. I know personally an EMT who responded to a call of one person who tried this over Lake Tahoe and "crashed" into the lake, but it wasn't in the papers or in the Wikipedia article.
Re: Man flies over South Africa in a chair tied to helium balloons [video]
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, smarty pants, who are these numerous persons who flew in their lawn chairs strapped to helium balloons to 15K feet? There must be heaps of them since they manage to keep ChuckMcM in a state of constant amazement.
If you followed the Wikipedia link there were 5 imitators listed, and the current story makes 6. These are the ones that got enough coverage to warrant an entry. I know personally an EMT who responded to a call of one person who tried this over Lake Tahoe and "crashed" into the lake, but it wasn't in the papers or in the Wikipedia article.
And only two reached 15K altitude, so your original comment rings hollow as there's basically no basis for being "always amazed" at this fact.
Re: Man flies over South Africa in a chair tied to helium balloons [video]
#48I don't want to be a party pooper, but... Helium is scarce enough to stop using it for this kind of purposes. http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-24903034
If it was a big deal, no doubt the price would rise.
Re: Man flies over South Africa in a chair tied to helium balloons [video]
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you followed the Wikipedia link there were 5 imitators listed, and the current story makes 6. These are the ones that got enough coverage to warrant an entry. I know personally an EMT who responded to a call of one person who tried this over Lake Tahoe and "crashed" into the lake, but it wasn't in the papers or in the Wikipedia article.
And only two reached 15K altitude, so your original comment rings hollow as there's basically no basis for being "always amazed" at this fact.
So do you have a problem with me or with the grammar? If its me my email is in my profile and I'm always ready to listen to feedback.
If its the grammar, my amazement comes from not one story of someone trying this stunt including extra oxygen. Many of the stories include the notion of a pellet gun to shoot individual balloons for altitude control. That sets up an additional failure mode where you pass out from lack of oxygen before you can shoot a balloon. That people fail to consider and plan for the failure modes of this stunt is always amazing to me.
Re: Man flies over South Africa in a chair tied to helium balloons [video]
#50I don't want to be a party pooper, but... Helium is scarce enough to stop using it for this kind of purposes. http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-24903034
If it was a big deal, no doubt the price would rise.
Markets are not rational. Even if they were, there's too many externalities not captured by the helium market price. Think of the negative side effects on science and health care.