FAI Ballooning Commission (CIA)

Great news air sports fans! We have a brand new FAI Hot Air Balloon World Champion: the British pilot Dominic Bareford.

The young Briton took on a huge field of the best balloonists in the world to finish in first place at the 23^rd FAI World Hot Air Balloon Championship in Groß Siegharts in Austria.

He was joined on the podium by Stefan Zeberli of Switzerland in silver medal position, and Russia's Sergey Latypov in third place.

It’s 40 years since American balloonist Ben Abruzzo broke both the distance and duration ballooning records by flying across the Atlantic Ocean from Presque Isle, Maine to the village of Miserey in France.

The crossing, which he undertook with team members Maxie Anderson and Larry Newman, took 137 hours, 5 minutes and 50 seconds, and covered a massive 5001.22 km.

Today, marks the 10th anniversary of Pauline Baker's record hot air balloon flight. On 24 January 2008, the Irish pilot broke the female altitude FAI World Records in class AX-03 (Hot-air balloons: 400 to 600 m³) and AX-04 (Hot-air balloons: 600 to 900 m³) after taking off from Mondovi (ITA) and reaching the altitude of 4272m. The records are still standing.