Hi all,

This year and last ive been crewing for the Royal Engineers balloon team at the Bristol balloon festival, (basically everything apart from the flying, Inflation, Deflation recovery etc)...you may think ballooning is nothing like flying...your correct about all they have in common are Pilot briefing Met etc and the fact you go up and down...but little control over the left and right part of it

The only bad part was getting up at 5am

Anyhow here are the photos from 2007


First day, about 7:00


135 Balloons here this year


The bit you dont see, chasing the ballon with its trailer


For my effort and work I got a flight


Burner


Early bird

Criticism Comments Welcome

That looks pretty fun, but what happens if you drift over the landing field 

Ravang wrote on Aug 15^th, 2007 at 1:55pm:


That's half the fun, or so I hear... you never know quite where you'll end up. Some directional control is possible, but only by ascending or descending to take advantage of favorable winds. that and of course, trying to descend in time when you find a suitable place.

It's not "really" flying ( ), but it's piloting, for sure... and I'd love to try it sometime, or at least go for a ride.
  Been to a balloon fest, and it's just a lot of fun to watch them.

masmith wrote on Aug 15^th, 2007 at 2:13pm:


In fact this year a few balloons came down in the middle of Bristol, on streets, with one even landing in the avon...ouch I bet that cost a bit

.mic

nice set up of shots