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balloons can stay aloft only as long as there
is fuel, such as propane, to send hot air up
into the envelope and for as long as the
balloon maintains its structural integrity. If
it’s a gas-filled helium balloon, which relies
on the expansion of an initial load of gas
that is lighter than the surrounding air to
rise and stay afloat, the daily warming and
cooling of day and night eventually takes its
toll – causing the balloon to lose volume and
eventually descend.
In 1984, hoping to span the globe in a
balloon, Nott developed the first operable
“pumpkin” balloon. The pumpkin balloon
is exactly as it sounds, a balloon shaped like a pumpkin. The design
has a structural advantage in that the pumpkin’s seams are laced with
seatbelt-like tapes that restrict the balloon’s expansion, allowing it to
be filled at higher pressure than the surrounding air. So, even as the
balloon’s pressure increases as it warms, its volume stays about the
same. This helps inoculate the balloon
from the daily warming and cooling
cycles, enabling it to fly steady through
night and day rather than rise and fall with
temperature and pressure fluctuations.
One problem Nott couldn’t solve was
the tendency of such a large shape to kink.
His balloon, the Wilson Endeavor, was
good enough, though, to make it across
Australia and Nott became the first man to
cross the subcontinent. Along the way, he
set distance, altitude, and duration records
for this type of balloon, now commonly
called a super-pressure balloon.
Nott was not the least bit discouraged
at not making it around the world. Call it
creative failure if you want. He prefers the
phrase “technology for art’s sake,” a credo
that has driven both his intellectual and
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Nott was the first to design, build, and pilot a pressurized cabin for a
hot-air balloon. The cabin designed by Julian and in which he set the
altitude record of 55,134 feet for a hot-air balloon, is now on permanent
display at Smithsonian Institute’s National Air and Space Museum
Udvar-Hazy Center at Dulles Airport in Washington, D.C.