I was driving through Albuquerque today, on the way home to visit my parents. While on the west side, driving along the Rio Grande (on Coors Road) I saw three hot air balloons that looked like they were flying pretty low. I was pretty excited, because it looked like I was headed straight towards them. By the time I reached them, the furthest one was less than a mile away. It was floating higher than all the rest of them, probably about 100 yards in the air. The other two were much closer. One must have only been 200 yards away, and about 60 feet high. I’m pretty sure about the distances on this one, because it was right above a tree I could also see the people moving about in the gondola, although I couldn’t make out their faces. The last was in the coolest location. It was directly over the Rio Grande, and below the treeline. It couldn’t have been more than 40 feet above the river! Pretty cool stuff.
I haven’t seen balloons that close since the last time I went to the International Balloon Fiestas. I imagine the pilots must be pretty highly skilled to get their balloon right above the river like that. The air was very still, until I was stopped at the light it looked like they weren’t even moving at all!
A bonus question to any pilots that read this thread; do you have any rotational control of your balloon at all? Is there any way to direct your balloon if the air is almost completely still at that altitude?
I miss seeing the balloons from my backyard in Rio Rancho. It was beautiful to see the sky filled with them. On a breezy day they would drift over my neighborhood to land in the nearby park and drive the dogs crazy but still very cool way to kill a morning. Living in AZ now I rarely see them but I did see one the other day in south Chandler.
I usually see 3 or 4, sometimes as many as 10, just about every morning on the way to work and over my office building. Saw one this morning. They often touch down in the empty lot across the street from the office. I never tire of them, I think they are just the coolest. Every year I say I’m going to splurge and go up in one with my husband during harvest, but just never get around to it.
A couple of years ago I got to see Mickey Mouse flying over head, which just totally brightened my day.
The past year or two there has definitely been a decrease in flights, but I still see a few just about every week, unless it’s raining or nasty out. Any day now we’re going to have zeppelins flying over the office. I seriously can’t wait for that!
I live in Rio Rancho (a suburb of Albuquerque), and I see them all the time. Not daily, but pretty much every weekend, and frequently during the week as well.
Last year’s Balloon Fiesta had about 700 balloons. They had about 1,000 a few years ago, but decided that was too many and cut back. It’s amazing to see hundreds of hot air balloons filling the sky.
I’m not a pilot, but I think the only control they have is in changing altitude. Fire up the burner to go higher, let out air through the crown vent to descend. No real steering.
I parachuted out of one once, wearing a helmet-cam. Got an awesome video!
It’s a trifle better than that. It’s not rare that the wind at different altitudes blows from different directions (typically not a great deal of difference, but some). This allows some steering by changing altitude.
Except when landing, it’s rarely necessary to vent air through the crown - you’re constantly losing heat to the atmosphere, so if you want to descend just wait a bit and you soon will.
Rotational control is, in my experience, nil. Swirls in the air may turn you, but it’s not under any normal pilot’s control. Approaching a landing, you can lower a rope to crew folks, which (provided the wind isn’t much) makes it easy to position the ballon for landing and deflation.
Thanks for the info. This is what happens when I act like I know what I’m talking about! I go up in one once and I think I’m an expert. What do they say about a little knowledge?
Xema, have you been to the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta? They have a phenomenon called the “box”- don’t know how common it is. It’s where the ground winds are out of one direction (usually the north), then the uppers are out of the opposite direction. I’ve seen balloons go up, drift south, gain altitude, come back north, and land back at the field they took off from.
Some years ago I belonged to the local balloon club. I joined to get experience crewing for the pilots.
During one meet we had the out of town pilot I crewed for gave us a ride, the only one I ever got. Now, ordnarily I’m afraid of heights, but somehow for this ride I was just thrilled. Orienting yourself from the air is a whole 'nother ballgame too. No wind chill, since you move at the same speed as the air you feel no breeze.
We inadvertently spooked some horses in a paddock surrounded by trees. The owner burst out of his house and screamed up at us that if the horse were hurt he’d shoot us! But the pilot was already giving the flames a boost to get us higher.
Most pilots in our club carried county maps. Areas marked in red was land they knew that property owners didn’t want us flying over, and they’d do their best to avoid them. But most folks in the country didn’t mind, especially if the pilot gave them a tether ride before deflating.
One time I was crewing for a pilot who had to land on a bare field, behind a fence. No house or owner in sight, but there was a gate and drive. But our rules stated we could not disturb property any more than was necessary, and opening the gate was not “necessary” We had to lift that heavy gondola over the fence by hand.
No. I’ve been to some in New England with about a dozen ballons present, and one in Idaho where there were at least 25 (but most didn’t fly on account of excessive wind). These numbers are of course negligible in comparison to what’s seen in Albuquerque.
In some locations this sort of thing happens regularly - though it’s usually still regarded as a commendable feat. I’ve done it once, in a valley where it was said to be normal in the morning.
Unfortunately, this is a regular problem. No one has been able to make a burner that can quietly put out the necessary amount of heat. Animals are often spooked, and farmers/landowners understandably tend to resent this.
My sister used to be a part of a balooning group around here (Austin.) She never made it to Albequerque, but they did go to Indianola. The corn in Indiana was high when they went, but it was also a lot cheaper than soybeans. All of the flights on that trip landed in cornfields, and the crew had to repack the ballon while it was on top of the corn, about six feet in the air.
Santo Rugger, Sis had pictures from a flight along a river. On still mornings, the air above a river may run along the riverbed, allowing the pilot to follow the water. Rate of ascent is predictable, but there is a lot of lag between firing the burners and the ballon actually rising. I think that Sis said that it took 30-60 seconds, so they had to prepare to rise above the trees a while before they got to them.
She also said that the pilot had to file the same flight plan as any airplane. They never quite knew what to list as their destination since the FAA wouldn’t allow them to use “downwind.”
It wasn’t the noise of the burner that spooked the horses, just the fact we were there, flying not too high. So the pilot took us up to get us away, to let the horses calm down, and to get us away from a guy who threatened to kill us.
Odd, dogs would bark at us, but cattle didn’t seem to have a problem. Those horses were scared. Don’t know about other livestock.
In the US at least, flight plans for VFR flight (which would cover all balloon flight) are optional. I don’t believe I’ve ever heard of a balloonist filing one for a routine flight. I can imagine this might happen in an area where airport tower controllers have asked to be made aware of balloon operations.
Yeah, I saw that VFR plans are optional. This was back in the late '70s. Could the rules have changed? Of course, it’s also possible that someone was just pulling my sister’s leg.
Ahh, that makes sense. I didn’t even think of that since all three balloons seemed to be completely still. A “tunnel” makes sense, though, kind of like a ping pong ball floating with the air from a hair dryer; if it drifts off path, the pressure is higher than the moving air, so it pushes it back into the stream. Cool stuff.
Yep; I believe it’s usually the first week in October. I often thank Og around that time of year, because the weather is the definition of perfect.
I’m sure you’re busy, but do you ever have a chance to chat with the pilots when they touch down? I’ve never met any personally, but they’ve got to be a pretty cool group of people.
I generally see a few every time I’m driving through Albuquerque, but I just never saw any this close. I almost felt like I could touch them. It must be pretty awesome seeing them land across the street all the time, for sure!
Cool stuff, isn’t it? FWIW, I was stopped at the Montaño light (it looks so wrong to type that without the ñ!)
I parachuted out of one once, wearing a helmet-cam. Got an awesome video!
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Can you post it?!
I’ve been flying, crewing, and just around hot air balloons in general since my father worked as the head of sales and marketing for a large manufacturer back in the early 80s.
Some balloons (usually ones that are commercially flown as flying advertisements) have special vents built into the side that allows the pilot to spin the balloon. Other than that, no radial control.
If the air is dead still (very rare), the pilot will ascend or descend to try and find some movement. Only once or twice in my life have I seen a pilot fly around for an hour or two directly above the field from which s/he took off.
It doesn’t take a whole lot of skill to hover around the ground and/or a body of water like that. Pretty much any pilot can do it, and I even did it a few times during some of my early training flights. Pilots like to skim the surface of the water for fun - a maneuver they call a “splash and dash”. I’ve seen my dad go hip-deep.
Contrary to what anyone may have told you, I’ve never heard of any balloonist filing a flight plan, mainly because it is impossible to know where you are going to go (other than generally, and that is often wrong) after you’ve left the ground.
Lag time between burner and the reaction of the balloon is nothing like 30 seconds, even for the largest ones. It’s about 4-10 seconds, depending on weather & balloon size.
Xema, cows and horses are at the very top of the list of animals to steer clear of, if possible.
Ballooning’s heyday was in the late-80s, and has dropped off considerably since then. It grew rapidly for a while, but is a shadow of what it was back when we were flying a lot.
Yeah, sometimes they don’t seem to care, sometimes they run like hell. I’m not exactly sure what sets them off, or what breeds of cattle react more. A big enough herd can stampede, though.
Excellent question. I really couldn’t say, but my best guess is that it was just one of those fads that became less popular over time. Also, the fact that it needs several people makes it a bit of a pain sometimes.
