Steve Fossett


James Stephen Fossett was an American businessman and a record-setting aviator, sailor, and adventurer. He was the first person to fly solo nonstop around the world in a balloon and in a fixed-wing aircraft. He made his fortune in the financial services industry and held world records for five nonstop circumnavigations of the Earth: as a long-distance solo balloonist, as a sailor, and as a solo flight fixed-wing aircraft pilot.
A fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and the Explorers Club, Fossett set more than one hundred records in five different sports, sixty of which still stood at the time of his death. He broke three of the seven absolute world records for fixed-wing aircraft recognized by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, all in his Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer. In 2002, he was awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Aero Club of the UK, and was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 2007.
Fossett disappeared on September 3, 2007, while flying a light aircraft over the Great Basin Desert, between Nevada and California. Fossett's plane was discovered wrecked in 2008.

Early years

Fossett was born in Jackson, Tennessee and grew up in Garden Grove, California, where he graduated from Garden Grove High School.
Fossett's interest in adventure began early. As a Boy Scout, he grew up climbing the mountains of California, beginning with the San Jacinto Mountains. "When I was 12 years old I climbed my first mountain, and I just kept going, taking on more diverse and grander projects." Fossett said that he did not have a natural gift for athletics or team sports, so he focused on activities that required persistence and endurance. His father, an Eagle Scout, encouraged Fossett to pursue these types of adventures and encouraged him to become involved with the Boy Scouts early. He became an active member of Troop 170 in Orange, California. At age 13, Fossett earned the Boy Scouts' highest rank of Eagle Scout. He was a Vigil Honor member of the Order of the Arrow, the Boy Scouts' honor society, where he served as lodge chief. He also worked as a Ranger at Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico during the summer of 1961. Fossett said in 2006 that Scouting was the most important activity of his youth.
In college at Stanford University, Fossett was already known as an adventurer; his Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity brothers convinced him to swim to Alcatraz and raise a banner that read "Beat Cal" on the wall of the prison, closed two years previously. He made the swim but was thwarted by a security guard when he arrived. While at Stanford, Fossett was a student body officer and served as the president of a few clubs. In 1966, Fossett graduated from Stanford with a degree in economics. Fossett spent the following summer in Europe climbing mountains and swimming the Dardanelles.

Business career

In 1968, Fossett received an MBA from the Olin School of Business at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, where he was later a longtime member of the Board of Trustees. Fossett's first job out of business school was with IBM; he then served as a consultant for Deloitte and Touche, and later accepted a job with Marshall Field's. Fossett later said, "For the first five years of my business career, I was distracted by being in computer systems, and then I became interested in financial markets. That's where I thrived."
Fossett then became a successful commodities salesman in Chicago, first for Merrill Lynch in 1973, where he proved a highly successful producer of commission revenue for himself and that firm. He began working in 1976 for Drexel Burnham, which assigned him one of its memberships on the Chicago Board of Trade and permitted him to market the services of the firm from a phone on the floor of that exchange. In 1980, Fossett began the process that eventually produced his enduring prosperity: renting exchange memberships to would-be floor traders, first on the Chicago Board Options Exchange.
After fifteen years of working for other companies, Fossett founded his own firms, Marathon Securities and Lakota Trading, from which he made millions renting exchange memberships. He founded Lakota Trading for that purpose in 1980. In the early 1980s, he founded Marathon Securities and extended that successful formula to memberships on the New York stock exchanges. He earned millions renting floor trading privileges to hopeful new floor traders, who also paid clearing fees to Fossett's clearing firms in proportion to the trading activity of those renting the memberships. In 1997, the trading volume of its rented memberships was larger than any other clearing firm on the Chicago exchange. Lakota Trading replicated that same business plan on many exchanges in the United States and also in London. Fossett later used those revenues to finance his adventures. Fossett said, "As a floor trader, I was very aggressive and worked hard. Those same traits help me in adventure sports."
Fossett said he did not participate in any of the "interesting things" he had done in college during his time in exchange-related activities: "There was a period of time where I wasn't doing anything except working for a living. I became very frustrated with that and finally made up my mind to start getting back into things." He began to take six weeks a year off to spend time on sports and moved to Beaver Creek, Colorado in 1990. Fossett later sold most of his business interests, although he maintained an office in Chicago until 2006.

Personal life

In 1968, Fossett married Peggy Fossett, who was originally from Richmond Heights, Missouri. They had no children. The Fossetts had homes in Beaver Creek, Colorado and Chicago, and a vacation home in Carmel, California. Fossett was friends with billionaire Richard Branson, whose Virgin Group sponsored some of Fossett's adventures.

Records

Overview

Steve Fossett was well known for his world records and adventures in balloons, sailboats, gliders, and powered aircraft. He was an aviator of exceptional breadth of experience. He wanted to become the first person to achieve a solo balloon flight around the world. He set, with co-pilot Terry Delore, 10 of the 21 Glider Open records, including the first 2,000 km Out-and-Return, the first 1,500 km Triangle and the longest Straight Distance flights. His achievements as a jet pilot in a Cessna Citation X include records for U.S. Transcontinental, Australia Transcontinental, and Round-the-World westbound non-supersonic flights. Prior to Fossett's aviation records, no pilot had held world records in more than one class of aircraft; Fossett held them in four classes.
In 2005, Fossett made the first solo, nonstop unrefueled circumnavigation of the world in an airplane, in 67 hours in the Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer, a single-engine jet aircraft.
In 2006, he again circumnavigated the globe nonstop and unrefueled in 76 hours, 45 minutes in the GlobalFlyer, setting the record for the longest flight by any aircraft in history with a distance of 25,766 statute miles.
He set 91 aviation world records ratified by Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, of which 36 stand, plus 23 sailing world records ratified by the World Sailing Speed Record Council.
On August 29, 2006, he set the world altitude record for gliders over El Calafate, Argentina at.

Balloon pilot

On February 21, 1995, Fossett landed in Leader, Saskatchewan, Canada, after taking off from South Korea, becoming the first person to make a solo flight across the Pacific Ocean in a balloon.
In 2002, he became the first person to fly around the world alone, nonstop in any kind of aircraft. He launched the 10-story high balloon Spirit of Freedom from Northam, Western Australia on June 19, 2002 and returned to Australia on July 3, 2002, subsequently landing in Queensland. Duration and distance of this solo balloon flight was 13 days, 8 hours, 33 minutes, 20,626.48 statute miles. The balloon dragged him along the ground for 20 minutes at the end of the flight. Only the capsule survived the landing; it was taken to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., where it was displayed. The control center for the mission was in Brookings Hall at Washington University in St. Louis. Fossett's top speed during the flight was over the Indian Ocean. The trip set a number of records for ballooning: Fastest, Fastest Around the World, Longest Distance Flown Solo in a Balloon, and 24-Hour Balloon Distance.
While Fossett had financed five previous tries himself, his successful record-setting flight was sponsored by Bud Light. In the end, Fossett actually made money on all his balloon flights. He bought a contingency insurance policy for $500,000 that would pay him $3 million if he succeeded in the flight. Along with sponsorship, that payment meant that in the end Fossett did not have to spend any of his money other than for initial expenses.

Sailor

Fossett was one of sailing's most prolific distance record holders. Speed sailing was his specialty and from 1993 to 2004 he dominated the record sheets, setting 23 official world records and nine distance race records. He is recognized by the World Sailing Speed Record Council as "the world's most accomplished speed sailor".
On the maxi-catamaran Cheyenne, Fossett twice set the prestigious 24 Hour Record of Sailing. In October 2001, Fossett and his crew set a transatlantic record of 4 days 17 hours, shattering the previous record by 43 hours 35 minutes; an increase in average speed of nearly seven knots.
In early 2004, Fossett, as skipper, set the Around the world sailing record of 58 days, 9 hours in Cheyenne with a crew of 13. In 2007, Fossett held the world record for crossing the Pacific Ocean in his sailboat, the PlayStation, which he accomplished on his fourth try.
Complete Summary of Sailing Records
13 Outright World Records:
  • Round Ireland 44 h 42 min 20 s Sep 1993
  • Hawaii-Japan 13 d 20 h 9 min July-Aug 1995
  • Pacific Ocean East to West 16 d 17 h 21 min Aug 1995
  • Newport-Bermuda 1 d 14 h 35 min 53 s Jan 2000
  • Miami-New York 2 d 5 h 54 min 42 s May 2001
  • TransAtlantic 4 d 17 h 28 min 6 s Oct 2001
  • Isle of Wight 2 h 33 min 55 s Nov 2001
  • Fastnet Course 35 h 17 min 14 s Mar 2002
  • Plymouth-LaRochelle 16 h 41 min 40 s Apr 2002
  • TransMed 18 h 46 min 48 s May 2002
  • Round Britain & Ireland 4 d 16 h 9 min 36 s Oct 2002
  • TransAt-Discovery Route 9 d 13 h 30 min 18 s Feb 2003
  • Round the World 58 d 9 h 32 min 45 s Feb-April 2004
2 Singlehanded World Records:
  • Pacific Ocean -World 20 d 9 h 52 min Aug 1996
  • Newport-Bermuda-World 40 h 51 min 54 s Jun 1999
9 Race Records:
  • Long Beach-Cabo San Lucas 3 d 2 h 59 min Nov 1995
  • Swiftsure 14 h 35 min 29 s May 1997
  • Windjammers 4 h 41 min 2 s Aug 1997
  • San Diego-Puerto Vallarta 62 h 20 min 11 s Feb 1998
  • Newport-Ensenada 6 h 46 min 40 s Apr 1998
  • Chicago-Mackinac 18 h 50 min 32 s Jul 1998
  • Pineapple Cup 2 d 20 h 8 min 5 s Feb 1999
  • Round St. Martin 2 h 4 min 23 s Mar 2003
Singlehanded Race Record:
  • California-Hawaii – Race 7 d 22 h 38 min July 1998
World Records set but later beaten:
  • Isle of Wight 3 h 35 min 38 s Sep 1994
  • Round Britain & Ireland 5 d 21 h 5 min 27 s Oct 1994
  • Transpac 6 d 16 h 7 min 16 s July 1995
  • Pacific Ocean Record 16 d 17 h 21 min 19 s Aug 1995
  • 24 Hour Record 580.23 nmi Mar 1999
  • 24 Hour Record 687.17 nmi Oct 2001
  • Cowes-St. Malo 6 h 21 min 54 s Dec 2001
At the time of his death a submarine, DeepFlight Challenger, was under construction to enable Fossett to be the first solo submariner to reach the Challenger Deep.