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As we near the 99-year anniversary of the Wright brothers’ historic first flight, a story about a pre-Wright flight is getting press in the major media. Rev. Burrell Cannon was the inventor of the Ezekiel Airship built between August 1901 and October 1902. Five eyewitness accounts are recorded at the Northeast Texas Rural Heritage Center and Museum in Pittsburg. “The airship rolled on its wheels and then became airborne,” according to the eyewitness accounts reported in a recent Wall Street Journal article. “It floated toward some boys who were sitting on a fence row, causing them to scramble to get out of the way. The pilot, a man by the name of Stamps, later said he shut the engine down because the old sawmill chain that turned the wheels caused such violent vibrations that he feared the aircraft would come apart.” The Ezekiel Airship is believed to have flown “one Sunday morning in late 1902,” the Wall Street Journal reported. Wilbur and Orville Wright made their first flight on Dec. 17, 1903. A new pilot facility is under construction in North Carolina to commemorate the Wright Brothers flight. Yet Ezekiel Airship believers dispute popular history and want the aircraft and inventor to get more credit as a flight pioneer. Pittsburg, Texas resident Jean Locke told the Wall Street Journal that her mother, one of the five witnesses, saw “the airship come up over the fence row high enough that the girls could see it was definitely in the air.” Cannon was apparently inspired to build the airship from the Bible’s first and 10th chapters of Ezekiel, which speak of a flying machine powered by “a wheel within a wheel.” The original Ezekiel Airship that allegedly flew was destroyed when it was blown off a train on its way to St. Louis where Cannon intended to fly it at the World’s Fair. Only one photo remains of the aircraft. A book and video about the aircraft are available from the museum web site at www.pittsburgtxmuseum.com.

Is the aircraft entry in your logbook always the same? Have you jumped all the planes and balloons at the World Freefall Convention and are in search of something a little more out of the ordinary? Try harnessing yourself to a cluster of helium balloons and then cutting loose to parachute back down. Ian Ashpole holds the Guinness World Record for climbing to 11,000 feet while attached to a cluster of 600 helium balloons and then parachuting back to earth. While Ian holds the official record that requires use of commercially available balloons, John Ninomiya has hit 21,400 feet and then descended with the balloons by popping some to lose altitude. According to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, these aren’t the only people making repeated jumps with a bouquet of balloons. Others cluster balloonists include Norwegian skydiver Trond Solli, Dutch-Indonesian artist Fiona Tan, hot-air balloon pioneer Don Piccard and balloonists Mike Howard and Steve Davis. Larry Walters was responsible for making the childhood daydream a reality when he soared 16,000 feet after attaching 45 helium weather balloons to his lawn chair. Walters used a BB gun to pop some of the balloons and eventually landed in power lines. Cluster balloonists are loosely regulated under Federal Aviation Regulation Part 103, which also applies to hang gliding and skydiving. Ninomiya seems to have the most thorough web site at www.clusterballoon.org. “Cluster balloons, for all of their whimsical appearance, also require real ballooning skills,” Ninomiya states. “Before I began flying cluster balloons, I was an FAA-licensed hot-air balloon pilot and had over 400 hours of pilot time in conventional hot-air balloons and Cloudhoppers. On each of my cluster balloon flights, I needed my skills as a balloon pilot to stay out of airspace where I wasn't supposed to be and to maneuver to a safe landing.” So when can I go?