Hampshire flying machine soars to success

9:17am Tuesday 10th June 2008

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FOR a matter of seconds, these magnificent men were soaring high in the sky in their flying machine.

That was until they flew too close to the sun, the wings snapped, the glider folded in half and they all plummeted 30ft into the chilly water below.

More than 80,000 people were there to witness the crash - but luckily, it wasn't a horrific accident but Southampton's winning entry in one of the craziest and most entertaining events of the year.

Led by Bitterne's Chris Gladwin, the four-man Team Glad Winners scooped the top spot in the 2008 Red Bull Flugtag, a competition where inventors throw caution - and themselves - to the wind by attempting to fly in manmade contraptions.

The brave Sotonians launched themselves off a 30ft-high ramp in London's Hyde Park on Saturday, gliding 17 metres before splashing down in The Serpentine.

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Watch Team Glad Winners' entry in action

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"I was looking at videos of last year's Flugtag on the Internet and although the entries were good I thought to myself I could do better than that'," explained Chris.

"That got the ball rolling and I designed an entry.

"To my surprise, three weeks later I got a call from Red Bull to say we were one of 40 teams selected out of 1,000 entries to take part.

"From then on it was action stations as we worked as hard as we could to get the glider built.

"My mates and I all have aviation backgrounds because we used to run a model flying club teaching kids to fly model aeroplanes and gliders, so we basically designed a big version."

The 9ft wide, 5ft long, 60kg glider was put together in an airfield in Marlborough in just a few months.

Team Glad Winners saw off competition from 39 other teams to win the £5,000 prize money.

Other highlights of the event included four breakdancing nuns, the Greek mythological character Icarus, and the ATeam characters who flew the iconic black GMC van.

Chris, 31, said that the team had impressed judges with their entry, which involved flying a model aeroplane shaped like a Red Bull can before launching the glider.

He added: "The judges obviously liked our efforts because despite not flying the furthest they rewarded us with first place.

"The whole event was a great laugh and plans are already in place to come back next year to defend our title."