Benoît Siméons (Belgium)
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At the age of 16 Benoît was the youngest pilot in Europe. Born in a family of balloonists, the story goes that he even was procreated in a gondola. His 2 brothers, Patrick and Jean-Frédéric, inherited the ballooning passion too. Benoît learned to fly with the help of the Leys brothers (winners of the last 3 Gordon Bennett races).
Benoît got a business engineer degree, and as a born adventurer he already visited the whole world with his hot air balloon. Some great occasions: a flight over the Chinese Wall (world-première), a flight above the deserts of New-Mexico, Morocco, Tunisia, Qatar, Karkoum (the most dangerous desert in the world), the crossing of the Channel, ascents from the Red Square in Moscow,… He is vice-world champion hot air airship and gained a gold medal FAI (winner of the David Niven cup). He has also written the Belgian altitude records AX-4 (2329 m) and AX-10 (12106,17 m) and the Belgian distance record AX-10 (502,27 km) to his name.
Benoît has flown over 1600 hours, both in hot-air balloons and gas balloons. At this moment he is manager of the “European Balloon Corporation” company. hours gas balloon : ---
Gas Balloon :
Gordon Bennett : |
