Results thru task 14

Here are the top 11 after tasks 1-14:
1 DONNER, Nick USA
2 PETREHN, John USA
3 HEARTSILL, Joe USA
4 MESSINES, Francois FRA
5 MIZUKAMI, Takao JPN
6 BOLZE, Stephane FRA
7 SCHNEIDER, Uwe GER
8 KOSTIUSKEVICIUS, Rimas LTU
9 FUJITA, Masahiko JPN
10 GIBBS, Paul AUS
11 PETREHN, Paul USA

For complete results: http://www.balloon2006worlds.com/results/HABWC06index.html

Keep in mind that there are 5 tasks that were flown today that are not yet included in these totals. My guess is that there will be some significant shake-up once those post.

Video from task 19

Shawn has outdone himself. He put together a video montage of Team USA's drops on the minimum distance target from tonight's flight. They take place in the order listed below:
Joe Heartsill / Nick Donner / Johnny Petrehn / Paul Petrehn task 19

Task 19

A minimum distance task with a common launch point was called for Thursday evening. Essentially each competitor had to fly for at least 20 minutes, then drop a marker as close to their take off point as possible. This meant taking off to the southwest, climbing to 2500+ feet to "back up" to the northeast, then descending to make a gravity marker drop a target back on the launch field. Here's Erica and Chase Donner cheesing it up before the flight:


It was a great evening for the crowd, as they got to see balloons launch, then throw on the target, and then land nearby. Several balloons disappeared into the clouds at altitude; we'll see how the event director chooses to handle that. It's different here in that there doesn't appear to be the air law restrictions that we usually fly under in the US. For example, many markers landed among the spectators, and several pilots made low flights (under 25') or radical descents over the crowd. So maybe IFR flights aren't a big deal.

It was an good evening for Team USA. It was hard to tell from the ground exactly how far each of them was from the target, but Joe looked like he was within a meter, and I don't think any of them was outside of 20 meters. Remember, those are gravity drops. Paul strung it out the longest of any competitor, coming across about 15 minutes before sunset (over an hour after he launched) with a drop of about 5 meters.

Here's a shot of a Kubicek XR racer:

Even among all the racer balloons here, it looks very skinny.

Tomorrow is going to be a very long day. First we have to check out of our cool Chase Commander hotel and drive 45 minutes to a briefing and flight in Motegi. That means we'll all be up at about 4:00am. And we can't check in to our new hotel in Motegi (the same one we were at earlier this week) until after the evening flight, which is 30 minutes west in the flatlands. Tonight after the flight we had to drive 45 minutes back to Motegi to drop the observer and refuel, then 45 minutes back to our hotel. No event that I've attended before can compare to the amount of driving around they make us do here. It's literally hundreds of miles a day. Nothing beats the competition at a Worlds, but this really makes me appreciate the well-structured, pilot-oriented events that I get to attend back home.

But as long as we have 4-5 tasks in the morning and a couple in the evening, it will all be fine.

Tasks 15, 16, 17, and 18

Thursday morning brought a JDG (judge declared goal), ANS (angle), FOT (pilot declared fly on), JDG (judge declared goal) from a common launch point. It was an interesting call because the final JDG was 25 miles east of the flatlands area where the first 3 tasks were. And given that 1 was an angle task, that means that balloons were headed into the mountains after flying for 2 hours and making at least 1 good ascent and 1 good decent. Even in a 56 with 60 gallons of fuel, Paul landed pretty empty.

Most balloons were forced to throw their final marker well short of the target due to the 10:00am close of the scoring period (Paul was about 8000m out). However, some (including all 4 Americans) were able to get near perfect scores of 180 degrees on the angle, so once again it's hard to tell what it all means.

Joe Zvada took a major one for the team today, wading through waist-deep water to identify and ensure the mark (by another observer) of Paul's marker for the angle task.

Here's some pictures from the first JDG this morning:


And here's Paul coming in:


And once again courtesy of Shawn Raya, here's the video of that approach and drop:
Paul Petrehn task 15

That's Johnny's voice over the radio letting him know not to drop it in the nearby river.

Happy Thanksgiving

It's Thursday morning in Japan, and the weather looks good again. If we can get 5-parters in on the morning flights and a couple in the evenings, we could be looking at 30-35 tasks total for the event, which wouldn't be bad.

I think I'm going to be short on t-shirts for the trip, which means I either need to find a laundromat or go buy more.

Al Nels has been working on a special Thanksgiving meal for the American team. He said turkey is impossible to get, but that he might be able to score some other homemade "American food" like hamburgers or pizza. Al's like a celebrity here, and has all the connections. I'm sure he'll put something great together. Otherwise we're pretty sure that the KFC in the parking lot of the new hotel has whole turkeys for 5500 yen (about $50).