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On 1 March 1999 Piccard and Brian Jones set off in the balloon Breitling Orbiter 3 from Château d’Oex in Switzerland on the non-stop balloon circumnavigation. They landed in Egypt after a 45,755 kilometre flight lasting 19 days, 21 hours and 47 minutes. In recognition of this accomplishment, he received the Harmon TrophyIn 1926 Clifford B. Harmon, a wealthy sportsman and aviator, established the Harmon Trophy a set of three international trophies to be awarded annually to the world's outstanding aviator, aviatrix, and aeronaut ( balloon or dirigible). A fourth trophy, th.

In 2004, he co-announced a project, in cooperation with the EPFL, for a solar-powered long-range glider named Solar Input . The project is grandiloquently dubbed "Une grande aventure humaine" ("a great human adventure"), and though a few technical improvements are involved in the project, it is percieved by researchers as an over-rated publicity operation, more than a real scientific achievement.