Hot Air Balloon Flight Record - 06Jul2003
Inventing Flight

We arrived in Dayton, OH Friday after noon, and about the same time President Bush was departing. They shutdown the Interstate about 1 mile short of our exit. We did manage to turn around and get off at the previous exit so we could stock up on ice and take the back roads to our hotel.

Friday night was supposed to be a balloon glow, but the winds were too much. Three or four balloons tried to inflate and a couple actually went hot and stood up for a few minutes. The Air Force Band started playing about 8:30 and completed the Star Spangled Banner and one opening number when the North West sky turned VERY dark. They announced that everyone should return to there cars when we were halfway back to ours. As we started down the runway toward the balloon gate the 45 mph winds hit. Next thing we knew we were dodging vendor tents and porta-johns that went sliding by.

Saturday morning the winds were still blowing so we had a late briefing in the hotel rather than on the field. The day turned very pleasant, but that night got nasty again and we even spent 15 minutes in a first floor interior room during the tornado warning.

Sunday morning was reasonably nice. The winds were calm, the lightning we saw in the distance to the north was moving away, and the forecast was for light winds till about 10 AM. While everyone was a bit reluctant to start, but the time we were ready to inflate the sky was completely clear. We took off from Wright field, near the USAF Museum, flew east north-east over the F-15, A-10, and B-1 parked on the ramp, and stayed south of Patterson field.

Our original landing target was a small parking lot near a small school, until we got close and discovered it wasn't complete and was full of mud puddles. We drifted over a little knoll to the fire station parking lot where we got permission to deflate quickly before shift change.

While we didn't get to fly much, we enjoyed the company and got to spend a day at the USAF Museum. Even a day is not enough time... and they are expanding the museum.