François Laurent d'Arlandes

François Laurent d'Arlandes
François Laurent d'Arlandes
	le marquis d'Arlandes
Born	1742
Died	May 1, 1809 (aged 66–67)

François Laurent d'Arlandes (French pronunciation:

marquis, soldier and a pioneer of hot air ballooning. He and Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier made the first manned free balloon flight on 21 November 1783, in a Montgolfier balloon.^[1]

D'Arlandes was born in

Jesuit college of Tournon

. He became an infantry officer in the French royal guard.

The first public demonstration of a balloon by the

Duchess de Polignac

to support his view that the honour of becoming first balloonists should belong to someone of higher status, and d'Arlandes agreed to accompany him. The King was persuaded to permit d'Arlandes and de Rozier to become the first pilots.

After several tethered tests to gain some experience of controlling the balloon, de Rozier and d'Arlandes made their first untethered flight in a Montgolfier hot air balloon on 21 November 1783, taking off at 1:54 p.m. from the garden of the

champagne

to celebrate the flight, a tradition carried on by balloonists to this day.

D'Arlandes proposed a flight to cross the English Channel in 1784, but the plan came to nothing.

He was dismissed from the army for cowardice after the French Revolution, and died in his castle of Saleton near Anneyron. Some sources suggest that he committed suicide.