Professor Piccard's stratosphere balloon destroyed by fire before experimental flight. Professor Piccard's ?000 hot-air stratosphere balloon was destroyed by fire at the military airfield of Zellick [Zellik], near Brussels, as the professor and his assistant, M. Max Coayans, where about to go up for an experimental flight. Just as the bag was taking a lift and the basket was about to be attached, the bottom of the envelope caught fire and the fabric went up in a burst of flames. 50 soldiers who were clinging on to the ropes holding the bag to the ground ran for their lives. The accident is attributed to a fold which formed in the envelope and which was touched by the burner heating the air. Photo shows: the balloon consumed in a column of smoke and flame. The basket is seen on the ground in the foreground. 25 May 1937