RENO, Nev. - "The sky was clear that morning, the wind light. Steve Fossett took off alone from hotel magnate Barron Hilton's ranch about 70 miles southeast of Reno in a blue and white stunt plane with orange stripes and blue sunbursts on the wings."

Fossett took off that day from near Minden, NV. That same day I drove from Minden to Virginia City, NV, back to Minden and then to Reno. The day was extremely windy, gusty, unpredictable. That evening I went out of my way to see if larger, commercial planes were taking off from the Reno airport. They were, but I would not have been surprised if they had not.

I've also flown the non-aerobatic version of the Citabria. It is a cloth-covered, tandem airplane and very light. His was aerobatic, and therefore had quite a bit more power, quite a bit more control. But was still small and light.

And the wind was such that it would have been impossible to control that plane much of the time.

I don't know where they get off saying the winds were light. Some of the time they were, and some of the time they were ferocious. A small plane wouldn't have had a chance.

Arf