A quitter he's NOT

Kent Couch is at it again. While the rest of the country was sleeping off Fourth of July revels on Saturday, he and a host of volunteers were up before the sun at his gas station in Bend, Ore., to blow up 150 giant latex party balloons and tie them with clothesline to his lawn chair for his third try at flying to Idaho.

Couch, 48, was inspired to go up, up, and away by a TV show about the 1982 lawn chair flight over Los Angeles by truck driver Larry Walters, who gained urban myth immortality and had a play written about him, but was fined $1,500 for violating air traffic rules.

Couch made his first ascent in 2006, staying up six hours before shooting out a few balloons with his pellet gun to descend. But he had to jump to earth in his parachute because he was coming down too fast. He never got that lawn chair back.

Last year, he flew 193 miles before running low on helium and landing in sagebrush near Union in northeast Oregon. The flights have gotten him on national TV, but that's not what drives him.

"There is this desire if you've ever had a cluster of balloons in your hand and just imagine yourself floating up in the air," Couch said. This year Couch made it to Cambridge, Idaho, about 235 miles across the Oregon desert. He touched down in a field by popping balloons with his Red Ryder BB gun. He also had a blow gun with steel darts and a parachute just in case.


See related story below (I hope it too had a happy ending)