On September 10 when Hurricane Irma was bashing Florida the Perlan team kept close watch on Sarastoga, Florida home of Perlan pilot Miguel Iturmendi. Miguel was home with his family. We are happy to report no significant damage to his family, house or hangar. Ken...
On September 9, 2017 Perlan 2 again went wave searching with Jim Payne and Tim Gardner at the controls. The Airbus Perlan Mission II ground team prepped the glider the day before. The forecasts were not strong but there would be wave. The balloon team gathered fresh...
Airbus Perlan Mission II tail camera photo from 54,000 feet (pressure altitude). Watch the Perlan 2 tail camera video as Morgan Sandercock takes the controls above 52,000 feet and tries out the handling qualities of Perlan 2. Jim Payne says "it flies better above...
On September 3, 2017 Airbus Perlan Mission II became a testament to what a volunteer team can accomplish. Perlan 2 flown by Jim Payne and Morgan Sandercock clawed their way to 52,172 feet GPS altitude with tenacious flying and strong support from the ground crew. The...
On September 1, 2017 Miguel thought he was going to talk to one classroom of students. Instead there was so much interest in Airbus Perlan Mission II that many teachers got together to use the civic auditorium again. There were over 150 middle school students to hear...
On August 23 and August 31 regional ANAC and EANA personnel respectively visited the Airbus Perlan Mission II team. ANAC is like FAA Aircraft and Pilot Certification in America. EANA is like Air Traffic Control in the USA. The presentation for ANAC was made by Jim and...
August 30, 2017 was Media Day for Airbus Perlan Mission II in El Calafate, Argentina. The journalists were interested in hearing the standard briefing with Jim in English and Miguel in Spanish, seeing the glider preparation and watching the launch from Runway 7. The...
August 29: Eleven years ago in El Calafate Einar Enevoldsen and Steve Fossett flew to the soaring world altitude record of 15,460 meters. Tago was a member of that first team and is with us in El Calafate. He shared his photos from that amazing day. We celebrate their...
On August 29, 2017, the eleventh anniversary of Einar and Steve's record flight, Airbus Perlan Mission II hosted an educational outreach presentation in El Calafate. Miguel Iturmendi was the lead for setting this up with 200 local students. It took him weeks to find a...
On August 25, 2017 Airbus Perlan Mission II team took a well earned sleep-in, but still went to hangar at 10 am for some planned work. With several days of very light winds forecast we had time available for some maintence. The front eyeball dual pane windows were...
So? Tago's 5-0 !!! Tago DePietro has been the Argentine coordinator of logistics for Perlan since the early days of Steve Fossett and Einar Enevoldson. When I realized Tago's 50th birthday would be during our El Calafate preparation time, it was the perfect excuse for...
The Perlan 2 wings are on! We are getting ready for Airbus Perlan Mission II - Campaign 2018. Again we awoke to fresh snow and icy roads at the end of July! But today we wanted to make progress towards flying in the Patagonia wave. So we scraped windshields and used...
The long-awaited Perlan container finally arrived in El Calafate! We had prepped the hangar with Mike and Tim doing lots of broom work. The Tribal truck driven by Daniel Garro arrived about 1 am. The next morning he brought it to the hangar ramp on a drizzly day. Tim...
The 2018 Perlan Team got to El Calafte in good order. However a blizzard closed the high passes of the Andes. So our container had a delay at the busy Chilean port of San Antonio. For the past few years the team has really wanted to travel only 4 hours south from El...
The Perlan Team gathered in Buenos Aires to fly together to El Calafate. Jim and Jackie Payne met Dan Gudgel and Mike Malis in Atlanta. Georgia thunderstorms caused some delays. But we had hours to spare in Buenos Aires. You usually transfer between airports EZE...
The 2018 Argentina Perlan Team is on the move! The journey is the destination. Ed and Linda Warnock led the first wave. They made a delightful side trip to Iguazu Falls in the very north of the Argentina/Brazil jungles. Morgan and Sandra Sandercock flew into Buenos...