Saturday July 22, 2017 Who flew today? If you guessed Jim, Tim or Morgan you would be wrong. And Miguel is due next week. So who flew? The answer would be Tago and Loris in a nice Airbus Eurocopter. Loris and Morgan were working on a misbehaving accelerometer in the...
There is so much behind the scenes work done to support or enhance every Perlan 2 flight. Telemetry is a major emphasis for Morgan Sandercock. And you must collect that in flight data through an antenna and wires to computers. 2017 had us eagerly waiting for Morgan's...
On July 18, 2017 Airbus Perlan Mission II took to the skies over Patagonia. Jim Payne and Tim Gardner in Perlan 2 made a short check flight with no expectation to try for altitude. There are so many integral components to a successful high altutude wave flight. All...
On July 16 we were hopeful to get the first wave flight accomplished. Unfortunately the cross winds were gusting 47 knots 40 degrees off the runway heading. We look at forecasts for low, mid level and high altitude wave. Mid level was very soft. Last year we found it...
On July 14, 2017 the Airbus Perlan Mission II team was finally ready to take to the skies of El Calafate, Argentina. The pressurized 2 seat glider was purpose built to fly high in mountain and stratospheric waves. El Calafate has two sources of soaring weather in the...
On July 14, 2017 the Perlan Weather Balloon crew got up very early. They took breakfast with them to the hangar. Sandra, Elizabeth, Loris, Stewart and Martin got the helium into balloon and were ready to launch. Unfortunately a plane landing almost 300 kilometers...
July 14, 2017 Everyone on the Perlan Team put max effort into today. Tim and Alec prepared the rebreathers and performed the systems checks. Stewart and Morgan put together telemetry antenna and early set-up. Stewart and Jim trouble shot the tow plane radio. The...
July 12, 2017 While our friends in Minden are cooking with temperatures near 100 F, we are wearing snow boots and fur hats inside the hangar in El Calafate. Today started -3 C and finally warmed to 5 C. That's a relative heat wave as the high will only be 2 or 3 C for...
July 11, 2017- A lot was accomplished today! The 12 people from Perlan all worked another full day. Elizabeth, Loris, Alec and Sandra made great progress on getting the weather balloon software to read the GPS data. Our checklists were updated with new procedures. We...
July 10, 2017- There's a lot of preparation work that is crtical for Airbus Perlan Mission II success. A new oil pre-heater was installed on the Boreo tow plane. We knew from Minden that one of the accelerometers had stopped sending data. So Morgan and Stewart found...
On April 3, 2018 the Perlan team again gathered in Washington DC to present to the Collier Selection Committee. Unfortunately Ed Warnock had to teach university classes so the team was comprised of Miguel Iturmendi, Jim Payne, Einar Enevoldson and Tim Gardner. The...
For a fun 360 spherical video that can look all around the Patagonia sky, go to Perlan Project's March 29, 2018 Facebook post linked below. Timelapse was used to conserve memory, so it is a bit quick to watch. My iPhone doesn't support 360 viewing, but my computer...
In Rosamond Greg Scates, Mike Malis and Jim Payne continue the upgrade progress on Perlan 2. The rear cockpit has the collar around the opening. The tool for the new front hatch is almost ready. The plug is a perfect match of the fuselage. The carbon fiber coupon for...
Perlan Project has three primary goals - Exploration, Innovation and Inspiration. Miguel Iturmendi volunteered to be a career speaker at Booker Middle School in Florida to inspire young minds about science and technology in aviation. He talked about Perlan and other...
Due to a springtime snow storm in the Northeast the NAA cancelled today’s Collier Trophy competition in Washington DC. It will be rescheduled at a future date. All Perlan’s key personnel were here, ready to tell our story of our significant aviation achievements in...
The absolute hottest ticket at the SSA 2018 Reno Convention was flying the Perlan Flight Simulator. We were maxed out all three days, with over 150 folks getting a real taste of flying high. There was no charge to fly, but the signup sheet showed lots of evidence of...