FAI Eliminated the single/double seat classes. So this record claim
breaks the Harris record. Here are the details from the FAI:

FAI has received the following Class D (Gliders) record claim :
================================================== ==================
Claim number : 14043
Sub-class DO (Open Class Gliders)
General Category
Type of record : Absolute altitude
Course/location : El Calafate (Argentina)
Performance : 15447 m
Pilot : Steve FOSSETT (USA)
Crew : ENEVOLDSON Einar
Glider : Glaser-Dirks DG-505
Date: 29.08.2006
Current record : 14 938 m (17.02.1986 - Robert R. HARRIS (1932), USA)
================================================== ==================
The details shown above are provisional. When all the evidence required
has
been received and checked, the exact figures will be established and
the
record ratified (if appropriate).


W.J. (Bill) Dean (U.K.). wrote:
The Robert Harris record of 49,009 ft absolute altitude was set in a single
seater, so surely it still stands.

The new record, if confirmed, will be for two seaters. So the position
will be as it was after Larry Edgar and Harold Kleiforth set the record of
44,255 ft on 19th March 1952, the two seater record will be higher than the
single seater record.

Is the record just broken the one set by Edgar and Kleiforth ?

W.J. (Bill) Dean (U.K.).
Remove "ic" to reply.


"Charles Yeates" wrote in message
...

Fossett claims gliding record (WOW : 50,699')
Aug. 30, 2006. 11:42 AM
BILL CORMIER
ASSOCIATED PRESS

BUENOS AIRES - U.S. tycoon and adventurer Steve Fossett, already famous
for sailboating and solo ballooning records, claims to have soared to new
heights in an engineless glider over the Argentine Andes.

The 62-year-old Chicago investment mogul said he and Norwegian co-pilot
Einar Enevoldson, 74, rode powerful rising air currents above the remote
Patagonia region on Tuesday, reaching a record 15,453 metres.

"We have made attempts in New Zealand, the United States and Argentina
over a period of five years, so this is a hard-won success," Fossett said
in the statement released by his publicist.

He said he was jubilant after breaking the record of 14,937 metres, set in
1986 by American Robert Harris in California's Sierra Nevada mountains.

Fossett's claim, which could not immediately be independently verified,
will now be subject to scrutiny by the world aviation authority, the
Federation Aeronautique Internationale.

He said he and Enevoldson, a former NASA test pilot, rode in a
lightweight, unpressurized glider named "Perlan" - Norwegian for
``pearl" - which was released from a tow plane at 3,962 metres. The pilots
then rose on currents above the Andes backbone near the border with Chile.

The two said they used El Calafate, a popular launch point near southern
Argentina's glaciers, some 2,092 kilometres south of the capital of Buenos
Aires.

Both wore pressurized suits for the more than four-hour climb to extreme
altitudes - where they relied on foot heaters to fight the chill in their
cramped cockpit as outside temperatures dropped to 71 degrees below zero.

They also said they collected meteorological data for a NASA and U.S. Navy
study of the polar vortex, a pattern of high-speed winds circling
Antarctica in the stratosphere.

Fossett said that during the flight they spotted a commercial airliner
cruising below the glider at 10,668 metres.

"I couldn't understand how the Chilean controller described us in Spanish
to the airline pilot," he said in the statement. "But I understood the
answer by the pilot: 'Wow.'''

Fossett and Enevoldson attempted to best Harris' mark - which stood for
more than 20 years - during three winter seasons in New Zealand from 2002
to 2004. But they said the atmospheric wave pattern there was not strong
enough to boost their glider high enough to match Harris' feat then.

Fossett told The Associated Press in 2004 that he was moving his effort to
Argentina.

In 2002, Fossett became the first to fly a hot air balloon solo around the
world, landing in the Australian outback on July 4. He nearly lost his
life twice in six attempts at the feat.