François Laurent d'Arlandes (; 1742 – 1 May 1809) was a French

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, soldier and a pioneer of hot air ballooning. He and Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier made the first manned free balloon flight on 21 November 1783, in a Montgolfier balloon. D'Arlandes was born in

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in the Dauphiné. He met

Joseph Montgolfier The Montgolfier brothers – Joseph-Michel Montgolfier (; 26 August 1740 – 26 June 1810) and Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier (; 6 January 1745 – 2 August 1799) – were aviation pioneers, balloonists and paper manufacturers from the commune A ...

at the

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college of Tournon. He became an infantry officer in the French royal guard. The first public demonstration of a balloon by the Montgolfier brothers took place in June 1783, and was followed by an untethered flight of a sheep, a cockerel and a duck from the front courtyard of the

Palace of Versailles The Palace of Versailles ( ; french: Château de Versailles ) is a former royal residence built by King Louis XIV located in Versailles, Yvelines, Versailles, about west of Paris, France. The palace is owned by the French Republic and since 19 ...

on 19 September. The French King Louis XVI decided that the first manned flight would contain two condemned criminals, but de Rozier enlisted the help of the

Duchess de Polignac Yolande Martine Gabrielle de Polastron, Duchess of Polignac (8 September 17499 December 1793) was the favourite of Marie Antoinette, whom she first met when she was presented at the Palace of Versailles in 1775, the year after Marie Antoinette be ...

to support his view that the honour of becoming first balloonists should belong to someone of higher status, and d'Arlandes agreed to accompany him. The King was persuaded to permit d'Arlandes and de Rozier to become the first pilots. After several tethered tests to gain some experience of controlling the balloon, de Rozier and d'Arlandes made their first untethered flight in a Montgolfier hot air balloon on 21 November 1783, taking off at 1:54 p.m. from the garden of the

Château de la Muette The Château de la Muette () is a château located on the edge of the Bois de Boulogne in Paris, France, near the Porte de la Muette. Three châteaux have been located on the site since a hunting lodge was transformed into the first château for ...

in the Bois de Boulogne, in the presence of the King. Also watching was U.S. envoy, Benjamin Franklin. Their 25-minute flight travelled slowly about 5½ miles (some 9 km) to the southeast, attaining an altitude of 3,000 feet, before returning to the ground at the

Butte-aux-Cailles The Butte-aux-Cailles (; a name that could be translated into "quail hill", although it originates from its former landowner Pierre Caille, who bought a vineyard here in 1543) is a hilltop neighbourhood of Paris, France France (), offi ...

, then on the outskirts of Paris. After the flight, the pilots drank champagne to celebrate the flight, a tradition carried on by balloonists to this day. D'Arlandes proposed a flight to cross the English Channel in 1784, but the plan came to nothing. He was dismissed from the army for cowardice after the French Revolution, and died in his castle of Saleton near

. Some sources suggest that he committed suicide.

External links

www.ballooninghistory.com
1742 births 1809 deaths French balloonists Flight altitude record holders Balloon flight record holders French aviation record holders {{France-engineer-stub