Ok, let's go.

Joseph, let's get some bigger bags and see what happens.

In a small village in France, in the 1700’s, lived two brothers, Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Étinne Montgolfier, sons of a paper manufacturer. One day, they were playing with paper bags placed over a fire and noticed that they were going up.

The brothers watched as their bags rose higher and higher thanks to the hot air coming from the fire of the bonfire. After this discovery, they decided to study more about this phenomenon. Although they did not have a scientific background, they knew the theories about the properties of air formulated by several chemists so they conducted several experiments.

They began to use large and lighter bags to know how high it could go. For some time, the brothers made balloons of various sizes and materials which reached heights never imagined, their dreams coming true thanks to their efforts. 

French society began to be interested in their incredible invention, so the brothers decided to build a large balloon which was manned by a chicken, a sheep and a duck.

Over time, the Montgolfier brothers toured Paris with different hot air balloons, some reaching a height of 900 meters, while others flew up to 3000 meters above the clouds.

The trip went wonderfully and after some tests, on November 21st, 1783, Pilatre de Rozier and the Marquis d’Arlandes, were the first humans to climb into a balloon that flew through the air outside Paris.

The friend and collaborator of the brothers, Pilatre de Rozier who was a professor of physics and chemistry, did not want to have simple trips, he wanted to travel from France to England so he decided to make a mixed hot air and hydrogen balloon, he and his companion, Pierre Romain, took off on June 15th, 1785.

At first everything went well, but the winds changed direction so the balloon deflated suddenly and then crashed, both crew members died, becoming the first two victims of a plane crash.