A man from North Carolina attempted a rather unusual hot air balloon flight when he tried to cross the Atlantic under the power of 365 helium balloons.
Unfortunately, Jonathan Trappe was unsuccessful in his unusual endeavour and was forced to abandon his unique hot air balloon ride after just 12 hours, when technical problems caused him to make an unexpected landing in Newfoundland.
Trappe was forced to hunker down in a remote part of the region until morning came and he could get back to civilization.
Trappe, 31, decided to use helium balloons in place of a traditional hot air balloon as it provided more of a challenge. Despite the practice being known to be a dangerous one, he had been confident about the challenge when he took to the skies in a scene resembling something from the Pixar movie ‘Up’.
Speaking of the challenge on his website, Trappe said:
“The Atlantic Ocean has been crossed many times, and in many ways, but never quite like this.”
More than 150 kind volunteers helped to fill the 365 balloons with helium, on the eve of his challenge before he set off from Northern Maine at sunrise on Thursday September 12, and it was late on Thursday evening when he took to Facebook to inform his followers that he had been forced to make an unexpected landing, leaving him and his team sorely disappointed after waiting 100 days for conditions to be just right.