A new Russian record for AX-9 balloon

After 19 hours and 10 minutes in the air the B&N Bank hot air balloon landed on March 15th at 00:54. Fedor Konyukhov and Ivan Menyalo set a new Russian record for the duration in the air on an AX-9 balloon with a size of 3950 cubic meters. 

The previous record of 17 hours and 49 minutes was set in February 2013 by a Russian pilot Vladimir Gladkov.

The decision to land in dark, instead of waiting for dawn was made by the pilots with safety being their main goal.  Despite having 4 more gallons of fuel they wanted to have a safe landing before reaching the busy airspace of Nizegorodskaya district. The pilots landed the vessel onto a large snowy field in the vicinity of Gubinskaya, Ivanovo oblast.  They were greeted with the cheers of their support team.  The landing went without a glitch and both pilots are in good physical health. 

President of the Balloon Federation of Russia, Leonid Tukhtyaev congratulated both pilots: “Today’s flight is going down in history.  A big team has achieved a big accomplishment. Something bigger than us has been done.”

Translated by Tatiana Koreski