Jul 2 1982
From The Space Library
Larry Walters of Los Angeles went for a 3-mile-high ride in an aluminum lawn chair borne aloft by 45 weather balloons and ballasted with jugs of water, ending with his unusual craft wrapped around power lines in Long Beach about 20 miles from his starting place in San Pedro. During his 45-minute flight he reached an altitude of 16,000 feet, got so cold he became numb, and had to shoot some of the balloons with a BB gun to make his flying chair descend.
He was also sighted by pilots of Delta Air Lines and Trans World Airlines jets. A safety inspector for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said that Walters had broken "some part of the Federal Aviation Act, and as soon as we decide which part it is some type of charge will be filed." Walters later said, "you couldn't pay me a million dollars to do it again." (NY Times, July 4/82, 22)
The French-Soviet crew of Soyuz T-6 that had visited Salyut 7 and its Soyuz T-5 occupants for a week returned safely to Earth at 6:21 p.m. Moscow time, landing near Arkalyk with cosmonauts Vladimir Dzhanibekov and Aleksandr Ivanchenkov and their visiting spacenaut from France, Col. Jean-Loup Chretien, "in good health." Tass said that the research planned by Soviet and French scientists was "accomplished in full." Work aboard Salyut 7 continued with cosmonauts Anatoly Berezovoy and Valentin Lebedev. (FBIS, Tass in English, July 2/82)
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