Right of Way for a balloon?

gkainz

gkainz

Final Approach
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Greg Kainz
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Does a balloon have right of way if ....


... it's at 1000' AGL, and






... it's not piloted, and






... it's helium, not hot air?






... and says "Happy Birthday" on it? :-)



spotted yesterday about 3 minutes after takeoff ... "Hey! What's that red dot over there?"
 
Ted and I saw the same type of ballon at 8500 on the way to Ohio several weeks ago...

My thoughts were "there's something you don't see everyday" and "there is a kid in a Red Robin parking lot in western PA balling their eyes out.":cryin:
 
I've seen that a couple times over major cities. Even had a BOS Approach controller give us a traffic call on a "bundle of balloons" once. Of course the best balloon of all...the time we almost killed Santa.
 
I thought I saw a balloon the other day, turns out if was a white plastic store bag caught up in a thermal.. we were at 7000ft and climbing... in the same thermal after we joined up in it. No helium, no mylar, just a lot of hot air.

:)
 
BillTIZ said:
I thought I saw a balloon the other day, turns out if was a white plastic store bag caught up in a thermal.. we were at 7000ft and climbing... in the same thermal after we joined up in it. No helium, no mylar, just a lot of hot air.

:)
Click to expand...

ive done a lot of thermalling with plastic or paper bags, and corn leaves. helium balloons are deceiving, makes you think theres a thermal there.
 
gkainz said:
Does a balloon have right of way if ....


... it's at 1000' AGL, and








... it's not piloted, and






... it's helium, not hot air?






... and says "Happy Birthday" on it? :-)



spotted yesterday about 3 minutes after takeoff ... "Hey! What's that red dot over there?"
Click to expand...


Was the kid still attached? :eek:
 
I don't like balloons. If they don't get out of the way, shoot them down. Damn gas bags.



:D
 
gkainz said:
kid still attached at that point would qualify as "Cargo" or "passenger" I think! :D
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:rofl: That's a fair point! A kid probably wouldn't have the lung capacity to "pilot" a balloon like that; certainly not at that altitude.
 
tonycondon said:
ive done a lot of thermalling with plastic or paper bags, and corn leaves. helium balloons are deceiving, makes you think theres a thermal there.
Click to expand...


As have I. I followed a red helium balloon up in a Thermal a week ago Saturday in my glider. I am surprised how often the Helium balloons get caught up in a thermal.

My best balloon story occured about 10 years ago. A local airport was hosting a Flour Bombing, Spot landing and Balloon pop contest. I have a lot of fun at these. As I was arriving at the airport before the contests began I noticed a black garbage bag floating away from the airport. As I taxied in and shut down I noticed a two place ultralight trainer with a pusher prop taxing out. After shutting down I learned that the garbage bag of balloons for the balloon pop contest had gotten away and the ultra light was going to try and retrieve it. It was pretty impressive to watch the guy on the front of the ultra light open his arms up wide and collide with the garbage bag. Balloons went everywhere as he hit it, but he was able to retrieve about 1/2 of the ballons. Later he said he was having second thoughts as he saw this bag appoaching at 30mph. He was really hoping no one had put a rock or something hard into the bag.

Brian
 
gkainz said:
Does a balloon have right of way if ....


... it's at 1000' AGL, and






... it's not piloted, and






... it's helium, not hot air?






... and says "Happy Birthday" on it? :-)



spotted yesterday about 3 minutes after takeoff ... "Hey! What's that red dot over there?"
Click to expand...

I'm still amazed at all the balloons I used to come along between 100 & 200', and hung up in the crop. Some days after a good wind off a city it would be a mylar jungle. Came back more than once with em jammed on my spray boom.
 
It's all fun and games, but I really did share airspace with a blimp one time. No big deal, except I was in a glider. I knew the right-of-way rules, but had never really given it much thought. Fortunately, he was just transitioning, and I had plenty of thermals and open fields to work with. Not something you deal with every day. I got a kick out of it.

M
 
foka4 said:
It's all fun and games, but I really did share airspace with a blimp one time. No big deal, except I was in a glider. I knew the right-of-way rules, but had never really given it much thought. Fortunately, he was just transitioning, and I had plenty of thermals and open fields to work with. Not something you deal with every day. I got a kick out of it.

M
Click to expand...

A Blimp hanges out at our feild durring the little league world series... nothing like watching a blimp do touch and goes...

I think Ted got cleared to land one time #2 behind the MetLife Blimp. :eek: Can we say S turns on Final...
 
I came whistling out of the bottom of a overcast one day at 250 kts only to see a hot air balloon and a couple really surprised aeronauts poking around with their balloon in the clouds. I hope it scared them as much as it did me.
ATC didn't know anything about them.
Dave
 
I worked at a job where we had the large 10' plastic bags (no one knew why we had them, where we inherited them from, or even where you could buy more). One of the engineers would toss a 10' strip of aluminum foil in the bag, fill the bag with helium from one of the lab instruments, tie off the end and let it go outside. We would watch it drift away while having lunch outside.

This was in Syosset, NY- fairly close to a number of towered airports. I always wondered what went on in ATC when the radar painted one of these things since it looked like they drifted fairly high.
 
foka4 said:
It's all fun and games, but I really did share airspace with a blimp one time. No big deal, except I was in a glider. I knew the right-of-way rules, but had never really given it much thought. Fortunately, he was just transitioning, and I had plenty of thermals and open fields to work with. Not something you deal with every day. I got a kick out of it.

M
Click to expand...

N51 (Solberg airport in NJ) used to be (still is?) a place where blimps would congregate. I once saw 5 on field- Metlife, Goodyear, some clothes manufacturer, Hood ice cream, and a Japanese company. It looked like something from another time. It was interesting seeing those close in the air.
 
Cap'n Jack said:
N51 (Solberg airport in NJ) used to be (still is?) a place where blimps would congregate. I once saw 5 on field- Metlife, Goodyear, some clothes manufacturer, Hood ice cream, and a Japanese company. It looked like something from another time. It was interesting seeing those close in the air.
Click to expand...

I haven't seen any sort of blimp congregation at Solberg but there was almost always a blimp there last summer (I was training out of nearby Somerset and you could see Solberg from the pattern, not to mention all the landings we did there). It would always be on the big grassy area west of the runway and never got in my way when it was coming or going.
 
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