New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1908-02-05
IN A FALLING BALLOON
Fearful and Tragic Experience OF
Three Aeronauts.
ONE SAVED AS BY A MIRACLE
The Terrific Cold and the Peculiar
Sensations That Encompassed the
Daring Voyagers at an Altitude of
Over Five MiIes-The Descent.

~1' hiS soy0SSiS at an stiAituQS u
Over Five MIes-The Descent.
One Of the most terrific experiences
In the history of ballooning was that
Of three aeronauts who in 1875 made
an ascension in a large and we'll made
balloon, the Zenith. In this voyage
the object was to reach the greatest
possible altitude The balloon rose to
a height of $4,000 fSet-that is, about
five and a half miles from the earth
At this point something happened
what, no one will ever know, since the
only surviving balloOnist Tissandier,
was at the time insensibe. But the
balloon began rapid fall and finally
struck the ground with such fright
full shock that Sivel and Croce-Spin-
nelli were killed instantly, while Tis
sanders life was spared by miracle.
The account of this voyage is per-
haps best told in Tissandiers own
words:
CAT $4,000 feet we were standing up
in the car. Swell, who had given up
Croce- Spinnelli was motionless in front
of me- l felt stupefed and frozen. |
wished to put on my fur gloves. But
without being conscious of it the &C
ton of taking them from my pocket
necessitated an effort that could no
longer make. l copy verbatim the fol
lowing lines which were written by
ola T ic+i
remembrance of doing so. They are
traced in a hardly legible manner by a
hand trembling with cold:
my hands are frozen. | am all
right. We are all right. Fog in the
horizon, with little rounded cirrus. We
are ascending Croce pants. He in
hales oxygen. Sivel closes his eyes.
Croce also closes his eyes. Sivel
throws out ballast Sivel seized his
knife and cut successfully three cords,
and the three bags emptied them
selves, and we assembled rapidly.
when Sivel cut away the bags OF
ballast at the height of about $4,000
feet / seemed to remember that he was
sitting at the bottom of the car and
nearly in the same position as Croce-
Spinnelli For my part, / was in the
angle of the car, thanks to which sup
port was able to hold up, but l soon
felt too weak even to turn my head to
look at my companions. This was
about 80 p. NJ. At 2:OS p. N.
awoke for a moment and found the
balloon rapidly descending. | was able
to cut away a bag of ballast to check
the speed and wrote in my notebook
the following words:
owe are descending Temperature
3 degrees. / throw out ballast Ba-
rometer 1874 inches. We are descend
ing Sivel and Croce still in a faint
ing state at the bottom of the car.
Descending very rapidly
Hardly had l written these lines
when a kind of trembling seized NE,
and fell back weakened again. There
was a violent wind from below up
ward, denoting very rapid descent.
After some minutes l felt myself
shaken by the arm and recognized
Croce, who had revived. Throw out
ballast he said to me. We are de-
scending' But | could hardly open
my eyes and did not see whether 81
vel was awake. | called to mind that
Croce unfastened the aspirator, which
he then threw overheard, and he threw
out ballast, rugs, etc.
''At $3.50 p. N. | opened my eyes
again. l felt dreadfully giddy and op
pressed, but gradually came to myself
The balloon was descending witt
frightful speed and making great oscil
Nations | crept along on my knees
and pulled Sivel and Croce by the
arm 'Sivel! Grocer l exclaimed
Wake up! My two companions were
huddled up motionless in the car, GOV
cred by their cloaks | collected all my
strength and endeavored to raise then
up. Siyel's face was black, his eye:
dull. and his mouth was open and full
$, of blood. Croce'S eyes were half clos
ed, and his mouth was bloody
ITO relate what happened afterwart
is impossible. l felt d frightful wind
We were still 9,7OO feet high There
remained in the car two bags of bal
last, which | threw out. | was draw
ing near the earth. looked for N.
knife to cut the small rope which hell
the anchor, but could not find it. | wa
like mailman and continued to call
'Siyel, Siyel" By good fortune l wa
able to put my hand upon my knit
and detach the anchor at the RICH
moment.
'The shock on coming to the groun
was dreadful The balloon seemed a
If it was being fattened. | thought
was going to remain where it had fal
en-, but the wind was high, and it wa
dragged across fields. The bodies O
my unfortunate friends were shake
about in the car, and | thought ever
moment they would be jerked out. A
length. however, | seized the valv
line, and the gas soon escaped fror
the balloon, which lodged against
tree. 1t was then o'clock On steI
ping out I was seized with a feveris
attack and sank down and thought fc