Pilâtre de Rozier, Jean-François

(1756-1785)

   physicist, aeronaut

   Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier, the first person to ascend with an untethered balloon, was born in Metz. The author of a work on the nature of gas and a founder of the Musée de Paris, the first museum of science and a meeting place for the leading scientific minds of the period, Pilâtre de Rozier was interested in balloon flight. After the success of the montgolfier brothers, he convinced King louis XVI to allow him and the marquis d'Ar-landes to make this first manned flight (November 1783) between the château de la Muette, in the Bois de Boulogne, and the Butte-aux-Cailles, across the Seine, landing about 8,200 meters from the starting point in about 20 minutes. Two years later, Pilâtre de Rozier attempted to travel across the English Channel in a hot-air balloon attached to a hydrogen one. But when a spark ignited the hydrogen, the balloons exploded and the passengers fell to their death near the French shore.