By Natalie De La Garza
Staff Writer
CARIBOU — Sometime this summer, when the weather cooperates, cluster balloonist Jonathan R. Trappe will take to the skies in a ship that’s appropriately named “The Improbable” and head east across the Atlantic Ocean. While there’s no way of knowing where the wind will take him — Morocco, Portugal, Paris — he does know that it’s going to take about 50 local volunteers and 12 hours of filling up balloons to get there.
“If you’re going to cross the Atlantic in a balloon from the United States, Aroostook is the place to do it — and that’s either Presque Isle or Caribou,” Trappe said. “Geographically it makes sense, and then there’s also the culture, the history and tradition of man’s transcontinental flight here — people are very proud of that.”
With a stack of magazines and books chronicling those who’ve flown before him — including the local legends Col. Joe Kittinger who launched a hot air balloon out of Caribou in 1984, and the story of Ben Abruzzo, Maxie Anderson and Larry Newman, who flew the first hot air balloon across the Atlantic Ocean in 1978 from Presque Isle. While Trappe knows his balloonists and ballooning, he’s deviating from the transcontinental greats in one highly apparent respect — the vessel he will be crossing the Atlantic in resembles the stuff of fantasy.
“We all had this idea,” Trappe said, pointing to a photo of himself on the cover of Smithsonian Air and Space Magazine, floating through the air with a cluster of colorful balloons — and thousands of feet of nothing between his feet and the distant ground.
Plenty of kids make the plausible connection early on — that if 10 balloons can lift a pencil then maybe … “but the answer is always ‘it just doesn’t work, it doesn’t work,’” Trappe said, pausing briefly for a big grin.
“It works.”
Despite how whimsical cluster ballooning may appear to be, there are countless hours of planning and experience involved. Trappe may have only entered the sport five years ago, but he has a lifetime of experiences that keep him well grounded while planning for flight. When he’s not flying cluster balloons over the English Channel, the Alps, or participating in other record-setting flights (he’s actually flown two houses, similar to the Disney movie “Up,”) Trappe is a technical projects manager at Accenture — a global information technology consulting company. He went to school at the University of Texas at Austin and received a degree in information systems.
“It’s about technical projects, kind of delivering on these large scale information systems projects, lots of moving pieces and you’ve got to plan and do the contingency and the risk management — all of that ports directly into this,” Trappe explained. “It’s very different, but the contingency of the planning, the risk management, all that comes from my training with the firm.”
Of course with that trained realism comes a full understanding of the risks associated with attempting to become the first cluster balloonist to cross the Atlantic.
“It’s not like being afraid of public speaking,” Trappe said with a bit of humor, “if you do something wrong, you will die – no messing around. You won’t get hurt, you’ll perish.”
With a keen eye for risk assessment and two feet firmly planted in realism — the logical question for Trappe is of course “why do you do it?”
“It’s one of those things that doesn’t make sense in the larger picture, but it makes our larger lives more enriched and more interesting,” he said. “The raw sense of adventure — the epic scale of it — and the scope and tradition of man in trans-Atlantic flight, it dates back generations since long before you or I were born.”
“Just to have the opportunity to float in the footsteps of those great pilots that went before is honor enough to make planning for everything that could go wrong worthwhile — and the sweep and scale of that adventure is epic,” Trappe added. He’s flown over Lake Michigan, over the White Cliffs of Dover and he’s even flown through Mexican skies, but “this great challenge, it’s the great white whale of adventure.”
(And yes, Moby Dick by Herman Melville is one of two books that will accompany Trappe on his journey).
Allowing Trappe to experience the earth in a very uncommon way is his ship “The Improbable.”
“I love that name quite a bit because it’s a highly improbable aircraft,” Trappe said. “It’s highly improbable — but it’s not impossible.”
Another improbable about the Improbable — Trappe purchased the lifeboat called a Portland Pudgy from the same state he selected for his launch.
“If you’re going to go from the U.S. in a balloon, you’re going to go from Maine,” Trappe said. “It just so happens by sheer chance, the people who make the gondola that’s perfect for actually flying are down in Portland.”
The last epic balloon flight out of Caribou is still remembered in the area’s hearts and minds. People remember the day Col. Kittinger launched on his solo trans-Atlantic flight — they shook his hand, or they took his picture, or they watched him float eastward.
Trappe is hopeful that the community will experience his launch in a little different way.
“We want people to help build the aircraft,” he said.
Two weekends ago, for instance, Boy Scouts from Troop 186 headed over to lend a hand filling ballast bags as part of launch preparation.
“In 30 years, those boys who were 10 years old didn’t shake my hand, they didn’t take my picture — they helped build the aircraft,” Trappe said.
As the launch date will be finalized within days of the actual flight, Trappe needs 50 or more people to help out.
“I say we want Mainers’ hands on the aircraft — we need it also,” Trapp said, emphasizing that the launch can’t occur without them.
Volunteers are going to need a bit of strength, too, as one cluster balloon has a lift of 15 pounds — that means a grouping of seven balloons is going to be able to lift over 100 pounds.
“If you imagine a 100-pound bucket of lead that you’re picking up — it takes the exact same thing, but you’re pulling in the opposite direction,” Trappe explained.
Service groups and volunteers through organizations like the Caribou Rotary Club and even professionals with the Caribou Fire Department have already signed up to assist, but more hands are needed to make the launch a success.
Individual interested in volunteering or looking for more information can visit the website at http://clusterballoon.com.
While Trappe’s epic flight will undoubtedly bring national attention to the most northeastern city in the United States, Trappe did cite one person with helping him choose to launch out of Caribou.
“I guess two words — Austin Bleess,” he said. “Your city manager has been very helpful and welcoming.”
