Heroes Welcomed

Thu., April 8, 1999

The Smithsonian Institution’s newest exhibit is as tall as the Leaning Tower of Pisa, is as heavy as a fighter plane and inflates to the volume of seven Olympic swimming pools: the silvery hot-air balloon that carried two adventurers 26,500 miles around the world in 20 days last month. The balloonists, Bertrand Piccard, 41, of Switzerland, left, and Brian Jones, 52, of Great Britain, were the first to accomplish the feat and got a hero’s welcome Wednesday at the museum, where their historic craft soon will be displayed alongside Charles Lindbergh’s plane, Orville and Wilbur Wright’s 1903 flier and the Apollo 11 command module from man’s first mission to the moon. Anheuser-Busch Cos., making good on a 1997 pledge to give $1 million to the first balloon team to travel nonstop around the globe, presented the money and the Budweiser Cup trophy to the duo.

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Heroes Welcomed

Jesse Tinsley

Jim Meehan

Molly Quinn

Rob Curley

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