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OUR ‘BALLOON BLOKE’ MAKES INTREPID FLIGHT South African expat floats from Robben Island to mainland using helium balloons
by STAFF REPORTER
THE eagle has landed! Matt Silver Vallance, a UK-based South African whose attempt to fly from Robben Island to Cape Town using a cluster of helium filled balloons to raise funds for the Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital, realised his dream on Saturday. Silver-Vallance, a strategic partnership manager for a medical technology company, currently based in Rugby, England, watched the sun rise from Robben Island as he and his support crew inflated 160 helium balloons. Seated in a paragliding harness, he was attached to the balloons, and gently floated up from the island to drift over the ocean towards the mainland. There was a thick cloud cover on the morning which delayed Silver-Vallance’s take off from Robben Island. After lift-off he spent 15 minutes up in the air attached to the ground by a single rope in order to equalise, after which he was released and began his journey across the sea. The northwesterly wind also switched direction during Silver-Vallance’s flight, and a southeasterly wind led him towards Sunset Beach and not to Eden on the Bay in Bloubergstrand as initially anticipated. Attempting to pop the balloons using a pellet gun did not pierce the balloons, making him unable to decrease his altitude. He then had to manually
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FREE AS A BIRD: Matt Silver Vallance, top right, floats high above the former penitentiary of Robben Island using 160 balloons. Due to fair weather and good winds, Silver Vallance’s bid for the mainland was made without injury. His flight is part of a drive to raise funds for the construction of a children’s hospital in Gauteng. To find out more, see www.balloonrun.com
drag the balloons closer towards him so that he could pierce them with a knife. He then encountered another challenge: During his descent, Silver-Vallance dropped to 5m above sea level, and had to release water from the ballasts attached to him in order to regain sufficient altitude and remain out
of the shark-infested waters. Silver-Vallance landed at Sunset Beach at approximately 12.45pm, an hour after he took off from Robben Island. At his highest point, Silver-Vallance soared 1,000m above sea level, before landing 300m offshore from Sunset Beach at Mouille Point. This daring stunt was four
years in planning, ensuring that all technical aspects ran smoothly, and that the fundraising capacities of the stunt were maximised. This, after all, was the main purpose behind the Balloon Run: to raise R10 million (£800,000) towards the building of the Nelson Mandela Children’s Continued on page 2
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