The air-balloon is an aerial means of transportation.
Before its creations, men had tried to tame the skies by imagining machines some odder than others, but all had a common point: they looked like birds (or tried to imitate birds).
The air-balloon doesn't look like any flying animal.

So, how did the Montgolfier brothers invent this machine?

As for many discoveries and inventions, it all happened accidentally. Joseph Montgolfier realized hot air was lighter than cold air. By hanging a shirt to dry up a chimney fire, it inflated. And by narrowing hot air inlet, he understood had just discovered what would enable him to realize his dream: to conquer the skies!

He and his brother Etienne kept on developing the idea, and, based on the various successes of their secret experiments, they decided to organize a public takeoff of one of their air-balloons.

Therefore, in 1783, they opened the path to the sky after the takeoff of their prototype: it went up to 1 000 meters high (328 ft). The flight was not very long, but it enabled the two brothers to become the inventors of the first flying object.

They had to move on to the next stage because they were not the only ones trying that king of experiments. Others were trying to use hydrogen, lighter than air.

It is in 1783, after king Louis XVI came to an agreement with the brothers (he feared for his subjects' lives) that was organized the first human flight in history! 28 minutes above the city of Paris, at around 330 ft of altitude.

With the appearance of zeppelins, air-balloons disappeared little by little. Too dangerous (the first man to fly was also, a few years later, the first one to die when trying to go across the Channel), not really freestanding, they had disadvantages hydrogen balloons had not.

A few enthusiasts still use them for leisure purposes. In 2003, a new altitude record was realized: 30 000 ft, something like the altitude planes fly at...