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Balloonists
In aeronautics, a balloon is an unpowered aerostat, which remains aloft or floats due to its buoyancy. A balloon may be free, moving with the wind, or tethered to a fixed point. It is distinct from an airship, which is a powered aerostat that can propel itself through the air in a controlled manner. Many balloons have a basket, gondola, or capsule suspended beneath the main envelope for carrying people or equipment (including cameras and telescopes, and flight-control mechanisms). Principles A balloon is conceptually the simplest of all flying machines. The balloon is a fabric envelope filled with a gas that is lighter than the surrounding atmosphere. As the entire balloon is less dense than its surroundings, it rises, taking along with it a basket, attached underneath, which carries passengers or payload. Although a balloon has no propulsion system, a degree of directional control is possible through making the balloon rise or sink in altitude to find favorable wind direct ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rozière Balloon
A Rozière balloon (or simply Rozière) is a type of hybrid balloon that has separate chambers for a non-heated lifting gas (such as hydrogen or helium) as well as for a heated lifting gas (as used in a hot air balloon or Montgolfière). The design was created by Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier (1754–1785).Shectman, p. 26. A Rozière-type balloon has the advantage of partial control of buoyancy with much less use of fuel than a typical hot air balloon. This reduction of fuel consumption has allowed Rozière balloons and their crew to achieve very long flight times, as much as several days or even weeks. Early endeavours The first Rozière was built for an attempt at crossing the English Channel on 15 June 1785. Contemporary accounts state that the balloon caught fire, suddenly deflated and crashed near Wimereux in the Pas-de-Calais, killing Rozier, who was riding the balloon. Modern era Today’s Rozière designs use non-flammable helium rather than hydrogen. Their primary app ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Superpressure Balloon
A superpressure balloon (SPB) is a style of aerostatic balloon where the volume of the balloon is kept relatively constant in the face of changes in ambient pressure outside the balloon, and the temperature of the contained lifting gas. This allows the balloon to keep a stable altitude for long periods. This is in contrast with much more common variable-volume balloons, which are either only partially filled with lifting gas, or made with more elastic materials. Also referred to as pumpkin or Ultra Long Distance Balloons (ULDB) balloons, the sealed balloon envelopes have a pumpkin shape at flight altitude. Operation In a variable-volume balloon, the volume of the lifting gas changes due to heating and cooling in the diurnal cycle. The cycle is magnified by a greenhouse effect inside the balloon, while the surrounding atmospheric gas is subject to a much more limited cyclical temperature change. As the lift gas heats and expands, the displacement of atmospheric gas increases, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Annonay
Annonay (; oc, Anonai) is a commune and largest city in the north of the Ardèche department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of southeastern France. It is the most populous commune in the Ardèche department although it is not the capital which is the smaller town of Privas. Other communes in the Ardéche department are Aubenas, Guilherand-Granges, and Tournon-sur-Rhône. Geography The commune consists of the city of Annonay and the hamlets of Vissenty, Chatinais, and Boucieu. With residential development, these four entities have merged into one today. Further away is the hamlet of Toissieu. Annonay was built over several small hills at the confluence of the rivers Cance (Canse) and Deûme (Deôme). Annonay is a crossroads of trade routes: from the Rhône Valley to the region of Saint-Étienne (east-west) and from Lyon to south of the Massif Central (north-south). It is located south of Lyon, south-west of Saint-Rambert-d'Albon, and north-west of Saint-Vallier at t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Montgolfier Brothers
The Montgolfier brothers – Joseph-Michel Montgolfier (; 26 August 1740 – 26 June 1810) and Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier (; 6 January 1745 – 2 August 1799) – were aviation pioneers, balloonists and paper manufacturers from the commune Annonay in Ardèche, France. They invented the ''Montgolfière''-style hot air balloon, globe aérostatique, which launched the first confirmed piloted ascent by humans in 1783, carrying Jacques-Étienne. Joseph-Michel also invented the self-acting hydraulic ram (1796) and Jacques-Étienne founded the first paper-making vocational school. Together, the brothers invented a process to manufacture transparent paper. Early years Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier were born into a family of paper manufacturers. Their parents were Pierre Montgolfier (1700–1793) and Anne Duret (1701–1760), who had 16 children. Pierre Montgolfier established his eldest son, Raymond (1730–1772), as his successor. Joseph-Michel was the 12th chil ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ballon
Ballon may refer to: Places * Ballon, County Carlow (''Balana'' in Irish), a village in Ireland *Grand Ballon, the apex of the Vosges Mountains in France *Ballon, Charente-Maritime, France *Ballon, Sarthe, France Others * Ballon (ballet), the appearance of being lightweight and light-footed while jumping *Ballon (surname) See also *Balloon (other) A balloon is a flexible container for (partially or fully) confining a gas. Balloon may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''Balloon'' (2017 film), a Tamil film by Sinish starring Jai, Anjali, and Janani Iyer * ''Balloon'' (201 ... * Balon (other) {{Disambiguation ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Circumnavigation
Circumnavigation is the complete navigation around an entire island, continent, or astronomical object, astronomical body (e.g. a planet or natural satellite, moon). This article focuses on the circumnavigation of Earth. The first recorded circumnavigation of the Earth was the Magellan's circumnavigation, Magellan–Elcano expedition, which sailed from Sanlucar de Barrameda, Spain in 1519 and returned in 1522, after crossing the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pacific, and Indian Ocean, Indian oceans. Since the rise of commercial aviation in the late 20th century, circumnavigating Earth is straightforward, usually taking days instead of years. Today, the challenge of circumnavigating Earth has shifted towards human and technological endurance, speed, and List of circumnavigations#Miscellaneous, less conventional methods. Etymology The word ''circumnavigation'' is a noun formed from the verb ''circumnavigate'', from the past participle of the Latin verb '':wikt:circumnav ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Methane
Methane ( , ) is a chemical compound with the chemical formula (one carbon atom bonded to four hydrogen atoms). It is a group-14 hydride, the simplest alkane, and the main constituent of natural gas. The relative abundance of methane on Earth makes it an economically attractive fuel, although capturing and storing it poses technical challenges due to its gaseous state under normal conditions for temperature and pressure. Naturally occurring methane is found both below ground and under the seafloor and is formed by both geological and biological processes. The largest reservoir of methane is under the seafloor in the form of methane clathrates. When methane reaches the surface and the atmosphere, it is known as atmospheric methane. The Earth's atmospheric methane concentration has increased by about 150% since 1750, and it accounts for 20% of the total radiative forcing from all of the long-lived and globally mixed greenhouse gases. It has also been detected on other plane ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ammonia
Ammonia is an inorganic compound of nitrogen and hydrogen with the formula . A stable binary hydride, and the simplest pnictogen hydride, ammonia is a colourless gas with a distinct pungent smell. Biologically, it is a common nitrogenous waste, particularly among aquatic organisms, and it contributes significantly to the nutritional needs of terrestrial organisms by serving as a precursor to 45% of the world's food and fertilizers. Around 70% of ammonia is used to make fertilisers in various forms and composition, such as urea and Diammonium phosphate. Ammonia in pure form is also applied directly into the soil. Ammonia, either directly or indirectly, is also a building block for the synthesis of many pharmaceutical products and is used in many commercial cleaning products. It is mainly collected by downward displacement of both air and water. Although common in nature—both terrestrially and in the outer planets of the Solar System—and in wide use, ammonia is both caust ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Helium
Helium (from el, ἥλιος, helios, lit=sun) is a chemical element with the symbol He and atomic number 2. It is a colorless, odorless, tasteless, non-toxic, inert, monatomic gas and the first in the noble gas group in the periodic table. Its boiling and melting point are the lowest among all the elements. It is the second lightest and second most abundant element in the observable universe (hydrogen is the lightest and most abundant). It is present at about 24% of the total elemental mass, which is more than 12 times the mass of all the heavier elements combined. Its abundance is similar to this in both the Sun and in Jupiter, due to the very high nuclear binding energy (per nucleon) of helium-4, with respect to the next three elements after helium. This helium-4 binding energy also accounts for why it is a product of both nuclear fusion and radioactive decay. The most common isotope of helium in the universe is helium-4, the vast majority of which was formed during t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coal Gas
Coal gas is a flammable gaseous fuel made from coal and supplied to the user via a piped distribution system. It is produced when coal is heated strongly in the absence of air. Town gas is a more general term referring to manufactured gaseous fuels produced for sale to consumers and municipalities. The original coal gas was produced by the coal gasification reaction, and thus the burnable component consisted of a roughly equal molecular mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen. Thus, coal gas was highly toxic. Other compositions contain additional calorific gases such as methane, produced by the Fischer-Tropsch process, and volatile hydrocarbons together with small quantities of non-calorific gases such as carbon dioxide and nitrogen. Prior to the development of natural gas supply and transmission—during the 1940s and 1950s in the United States and during the late 1960s and 1970s in the United Kingdom and Australia—almost all gas for fuel and lighting was manufactured fro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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