Hydrogen balloon heading for Europe makes 'precautionary landing' in eastern P.E.I.
All 3 crew members safe after landing, TSB collecting data and assessing situation
Three crew members are safe after a hydrogen balloon on a transatlantic flight path had to make what the Transportation Safety Board is calling a precautionary landing in Prince Edward Island.
"It is with a heavy heart that we have to inform you that the Torabhaig Atlantic Explorer Balloon has been forced to land ... with a suspected gas leak," reads a post on the project's Facebook page.
The balloon landed in a swamp near Cardigan, on P.E.I.'s east coast, where crew members became stuck, said the Halifax-based Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centre.
The rescue centre said a local EMS team treated one crew member for minor injuries, and all three are safe.
"This was a precautionary landing, not necessarily an emergency landing. The balloon landed in a boggy/marshy area and came to rest on its side," the Transportation Safety Board of Canada said in an email to CBC News. The federal agency said it is collecting data and assessing the incident.
End of mission called 'heartbreaking'
A hydrogen balloon flies by using a sealed sack of hydrogen gas, which gives the balloon buoyancy, said Kevin Stass, a member of the flight control team who is located in the United Kingdom.
During the daytime, the sun heats the gas, which causes it to expand and thus lifts the balloon higher, he told CBC News in an interview.
On Thursday, the crew could not understand why the balloon was not rising during the daytime when the sun's warmth should have been causing it to do so, he said. That's what led them to conclude they had a gas leak.
When you're going to commit yourself to flying across the Atlantic, you've got to make sure that everything is absolutely correct.— Kevin Stass
"When you're going to commit yourself to flying across the Atlantic, you've got to make sure that everything is absolutely correct," Stass said. "Unfortunately, they had to come to the very hard decision of having to land."
Stass said the plan was always to stay on or close to land for the first 24 hours of the adventure, before taking the balloon out over the Atlantic. He said the balloon was damaged during the landing, so the mission is over for now.
The crew was "extremely disappointed" about the landing, Stass said.
"To have something like this happen... it's heartbreaking really," he said.
Similar attempt in 2024
The Torabhaig Atlantic Explorer was aiming to be the first craft of its kind to cross the Atlantic Ocean, according to the group's website.
According to a series of posts on the group's website, a similar attempt was made in 2024. The attempt was aborted because of weather, with the balloon making its landing in New Brunswick.
A post on the site said the balloon, "piloted by Bert Padelt and co-piloted by Peter Cuneo and Alicia Hempleman-Adams, will take flight as part of an audacious adventure of old friends on a journey that will look for new scientific discoveries while aiming to become the first ever flight of an open basket hydrogen balloon across the Atlantic."
The project's website said the balloon took off from Presque Isle, Me., Wednesday night around 10 p.m. ET.
"Their route will take them from Maine over Newfoundland, Canada, across the Atlantic Ocean, and then Ireland and Scottish waters before landing in Europe, traversing over many thousands of miles," the site said.
In the hour before the emergency landing, many Prince Edward Islanders noted the white aircraft in the sky and posted photos and questions about it on social media.
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With files from Nicola MacLeod