After a week of rain delays, Gus McLeod thought he was finally getting underway on his record-setting quest to be the first person to circumnavigate the globe from Pole to Pole.

Instead, after hearing an alarming rattling noise after take-off in his South Korean-built experimental aircraft, he was forced to land in Frederick, Maryland, after traveling just 30 miles.

Upon touching down at the Frederick Municipal Airport the nose gear collapsed on the runway. It is there the "Firefly" remains awaiting repairs.

"The bolt supporting the nose gear suffered metal fatigue and broke, causing the front landing gear to collapse," said McLeod. "It's not nearly as bad as I originally thought, so repairs should be no big deal. Had the nose gear failed in a remote area, the flight could have been delayed for months due to lack of spare parts."

After two sleepless nights and many teleconferences, McLeod and his support team redesigned the nose gear so it would no longer be dependent on one bolt. Enginners with the Korean Aerospace Research Institute, which designed the aircraft, will arrive Thursday to further assess the damage.

McLeod's record attempt has been beset by delays. However, the veteran flyer should be used to frustration by now. It was a nose wheel incident that delayed an earlier record-setting open cockpit flight to the North Pole in year 2000. However, that delay was only one day.

This temporary setback isn't expected to have a major effect on the current record attempt. However, should repairs run into November, McLeod will have to reroute the flight to cross the South Pole first, instead of the North Pole as originally planned.