Bertrand Piccard

Dr Bertrand Piccard is a Swiss psychiatrist and balloonist born in LausanneVaud, Vaud canton, on March 1, 1958. His grandfather Auguste Piccard was also a noted balloonist and inventor.

On 1 March 1999 Piccard and Brian Jones set off in the balloon Breitling Orbiter 3 from Château d’Oex in Switzerland on the non-stop balloon circumnavigation. They landed in Egypt after a 45,755 kilometre flight lasting 19 days, 21 hours and 47 minutes. In recognition of this accomplishment, he received the Harmon Trophy.

In 2004, he co-announced a project, in cooperation with the EPFL, for a solar-powered long-range glider named Solar Input. The project is grandiloquently dubbed "Une grande aventure humaine" ("a great human adventure"), and though a few technical improvements are involved in the project, it is percieved by researchers as an over-rated publicity operation, more than a real scientific achievement.

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