Word: balloon
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...round-the-world ballooning attempt by Richard Branson and his team is ever set to music, the tune for the past few days will be "First There Is a Mountain" -- both geographically and politically -- as the ICO Global balloon hovered high over the Himalayas and then briefly faced even more impenetrable obstacles from Chinese authorities, who finally relented and let them pass through their airspace. Today, continuing through the Donovan catalog, the theme song is "Catch the Wind" -- and have they ever: Now well ensconced in the jet stream over the Pacific Ocean, the balloon is moving eastward at speeds...
Create a record company, an airline and a megastore. Make a billion dollars. Fly a giant balloon over Tibet during a late-December trip around the world. Make the Chinese government angry and -- maybe the greatest accomplishment of all -- get away with it. That's the scorecard so far for Richard Branson, as China bowed to pressure from the British government late Tuesday and granted the entrepreneur and balloonist extraordinaire permission to fly over its airspace.?Branson and his two balloon-mates, American millionaire Steve Fossett and Per Lindstrand of Sweden, then drifted placidly -- if more slowly than they...
...Global balloon team may face yet another earthbound political threat: The winds are taking their craft straight toward the world's most closed and paranoid nation, North Korea. If they're fortunate, an atmospheric depression will steer them over South Korea instead. And from there, it's on to America, which the team hopes to reach by Christmas. From his perch 31,000 feet above the earth, Branson is no doubt wishing for the holiday to be a windy...
Although Richard Branson and his team have avoided the ignominy of aborting their balloon flight because of Chinese territorial sensitivity, they're not home free by any stretch. The crew of the ICO Global hot-air balloon is now wafting over Tibet in search of a fast draft that will carry them swiftly eastward -- and out of Chinese airspace...
China nearly scotched the mission when it ordered them to land at an airfield in Lhasa, Tibet, Tuesday, but the balloon overshot the target and couldn't come down anywhere else in the mountainous region. An appeal by British prime minister Tony Blair finally secured them the right to overfly northern China, the last geopolitical hurdle on their round-the-world flight. But the threat of ice buildup forced ICO Global to use more fuel than anticipated to stay above the Himalayan clouds, and with sluggish winds pushing them along at 50 mph -- less than half the speed needed...