60th Gordon Bennett Cup 2016 - Gladbeck (GER) - Highlight

Aviation sport: The FAI World Long Distance Gas Balloon Championship

60th Gordon Bennett Cup 2016

September 15 to 24, 2016, Gladbeck (GER)

 

Gladbeck, Germany, 19 September 2016 – The race is on! Gas-balloonists from a dozen countries launched late on Sunday night 18 September 2016 at the start of what is aviation’s oldest and most prestigious gas-balloon race – the 60th Coupe Aéronautique Gordon Bennett.
Forty-eight pilots in 24 gas-balloons – two pilots in each balloon – set off from Gladbeck, northwest Germany around midnight, launching into a moonlit sky and heading south, carried along only by the wind.
Rising quickly into the air each balloon was launched individually under the glare of floodlights as a sound system played out the respective pilots’ national anthem.