Early in the next year Santos Dumont continued his experiments at Monaco, and on one occasion came down in the sea, and had to be rescued in the Prince of Monaco’s own steam yacht. After this there was a talk of further voyages being made in England, but the project came to nothing, and although Dumont made other ascents in Paris in the summer of 1903, he does not appear to have eclipsed his previous record. But although Santos Dumont came through all his accidents and perils so happily, his example led to terrible disaster on the part of a luckless imitator. In 1902 M. Severo, also a Brazilian, was fired with a desire to share his fellow-countryman’s fame, and he also constructed an airship with which he proposed to do great things. But while Dumont was a skilled aeronaut of large experience, as well as a mechanician, Severo knew scarcely anything about the subject, and had only been aloft once or twice. Proof of his ignorance is shown by the fact that his motor-engine was placed only a few feet away from the valve through which the gas from the balloon would escape. The ascent took place in Paris early in the morning of the 12th of May, and was witnessed, unhappily, by Severo’s wife and son. Bidding them good-bye, he stepped into the car, and, accompanied by an assistant, rose above the town. The balloon rose steadily, and appeared to steer well. Then Severo commenced to throw out ballast, and when the airship had risen 2000 feet it was suddenly seen to burst into a sheet of flame. A terrible explosion followed, and then the whole fell to the ground a hopeless wreck, and the two men were dashed to pieces in the fall. It is believed that this dreadful disaster, which recalls the fate of Pilâtre de Rozier, was caused by the hydrogen gas, which escaped from the valve during the rapid rise, becoming ignited by the engine, which, as has been said, was placed dangerously close. Nor was this, unhappily, the only accident of the kind in Paris during the year. Only five months later, on the 13th of October, Baron Bradsky ascended with an assistant in a large airship of his own invention. Through faulty construction, the steel wires which fastened the car to the balloon broke, the two became separated, the car fell, and its occupants were killed on the spot.