People first experienced flying by using a hot air balloon. The first-ever recorded hot air balloon flight was in France in the summer of 1783. Two brothers, Joseph and Etienne Montgolfer, experimented with paper models heated by hot air at their family’s paper factory. On the day of their launch, thousands of people turned out to watch the Montgolfer balloon take off. The French King Louis XVI was among the crowd. The balloon’s maiden flight was a great success. Hot air ballooning became an instant national triumph for France. The French nation loved the Montgolfers, who were seen as a shining example of the country’s new age of adventure and invention.

However, the Montgolfer brothers were not on board their balloon. The passengers in the hot air balloon included a duck, a sheep and a chicken! A couple of months later, on 21 November 1783, two brave men called Marquis Francois d’Arlandes and Pilatre de Rozier entered the history books as the world’s first people to take safely to the air.

The Montgolfer’s design of a hot air balloon is similar to the designs still in use today. Hot air balloons work on a very basic scientific theory. Warm air rises up through cooler air. Warm air in the balloon makes the hot air balloon rise up through the cooler air surrounding it. To stay airborne, the balloon needs to remain hotter than the surrounding air. As the air inside the balloon cools, the balloon drops slowly towards the ground. A gas-powered burner underneath the balloon warms up the air inside the balloon and makes it rise again.

Hot air balloons come in many different shapes and sizes. Most hot air balloons use wicker baskets for the passenger compartment. Wicker is sturdy but lightweight. For the hot air and lift, today’s balloons use propane that is stored in compressed liquid form in lightweight cylinders. By contrast, the first balloons burnt straw and manure in a fire pit to raise the balloon into the air. The fire and paper was very combustible and very dangerous. Sadly, Pilatre de Rozier died on a flight that went wrong as he tried to cross the sea between England and France.