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More than 140 people were injured when gas-filled balloons exploded at a governing party campaign concert in the Armenian capital.

As a fierce thunderstorm that seemed to come out of nowhere closed in, hot-air balloon pilot Edward Ristaino spotted an open field 4,000 feet below and calmly and tersely warned the five skydivers aboard the craft, "You need to get out now." He may have saved their lives, but he lost his own. With lightning spidering across the sky and the wind rocking their parachutes, the skydivers floated safely to the ground, while the balloon was sucked up into the clouds, then sent crashing to earth. Ristaino's body wasn't found until Monday, nearly three days later. "If we would...

A challenge usually left to NASA eggheads or PhD students was conquered by two Toronto teenagers earlier this month when Mathew Ho and Asad Muhammad sent a Lego-manned flight capsule into space. The two 17-year-old Agincourt Collegiate Institute students completed their year-long mission two weeks ago, successfully sending a balloon carrying a Lego man and a small Canadian flag out of earth's atmosphere. The unit was launched from a park near Ho's east-end home and ascended 80,000 feet before the balloon popped. The Lego man and his cargo fell safely to earth, with the help of a homemade parachute, where...

The press corps has a mild buzz going about a weekend contretemps ginned up, for publicity's sake, by Sarah Palin's camp, in her ongoing campaign to show how badly she is victimized by the media. The odd thing is that she has been victimized by the media, horribly so, and many of us (myself included, in several posts after the Gabby Giffords shooting) have rushed to her defense -- so she doesn't need to gin up controversies out of thin air. But that's exactly what she and her team did this past weekend.

From rice to toothpaste, items floated to North February 26, 2011 In addition to fliers, the South Korean military has been sending up necessities like medicine and clothes in giant balloons across the demilitarized zone into North Korea. The military has been flying more than 10,000 material goods over the border since early this month, according to a Ministry of National Defense report given to National Assembly lawmaker Representative Song Young-sun on Thursday. The goods in the airborne packages include instant rice, radios, toothpaste, toothbrushes, pens and erasers. The total cost of the operation is estimated to be 620 million...

An Israeli warplane has shot down a "suspicious object" flying over the southern part of the Dead Sea, the military said, adding that the intruder appeared to have been a balloon. The country's main nuclear reactor is about 30 kilometres from the Dead Sea, at Dimona in the Negev desert. "Air force planes were scrambled after a suspicious object was seen," a military spokeswoman told AFP yesterday. "It was shot down." She did not elaborate. Local news site Ynet said one of the planes fired a missile at the object "which was hovering close to the nuclear research institute at...

As Joe Kittinger found out in 1960, it’s hard to jump from a height of 102,800 feet—let alone in an open gondola, in minus 100 F temperatures, wearing 160 pounds of equipment—and survive. As Michele Fournier reaffirmed this weekend on an airfield in Saskatchewan, it’s even more difficult to break that 50-year-old record for the highest free fall. The French parachutist attempted, for the fourth time, to rise to a height of 130,000 feet in a pressurized capsule dangling beneath a high-altitude air balloon, then step out of it and hurtle toward Earth at supersonic speed, breaking the sound barrier....

The U.S. military has begun testing massive high-tech dirigibles — designed to provide battlefield commanders with a bird's-eye view of cruise missiles or other threats — in the skies over the Utah desert. An unmanned 242-foot-long balloon was launched Wednesday morning about 80 miles west of Salt Lake City. It stayed aloft for about three hours before it was pulled back down as planned, according to Paula Nicholson, a spokeswoman for Dugway Proving Ground. Vast tracts of military-owned desert were chosen for the testing because of their remoteness and resemblance to the mountainous, arid environment of Afghanistan, the military said...

The unearthly beauty of this image taken high above the planet would make Nasa proud. But it didn't need millions of pounds of technology to capture. Just a little British ingenuity that saw a standard digital camera taped to a helium balloon and floated into the sky. Space enthusiast Robert Harrison managed to send his home-made contraption 22 miles - or 116,160 feet - above the earth's surface from his back garden.

A privately funded team will attempt this year to break a 50-year-old record for the highest-altitude parachute jump, floating a balloon well into the stratosphere before its pilot leaps out for a supersonic free fall. The team behind the Red Bull Stratos mission announced details of the attempt here Friday morning in a media briefing. If all goes as planned, a towering helium balloon will loft Austrian-born skydiver and BASE jumper Felix Baumgartner, 40, roughly 37 kilometers into the air before he begins his descent. (BASE stands for "buildings, antennas, spans, Earth"—the places and structures from which a BASE parachutist...

DENVER — The mother of the 6-year-old boy once feared missing inside a runaway helium balloon admitted the whole saga was a hoax, according to court documents released Friday. Mayumi Heene told sheriff's deputies that she and her husband Richard "knew all along that Falcon was hiding in the residence" in Fort Collins, according to an affidavit used to get a search warrant for the home.

SASKATOON, Saskatchewan, Oct. 22 (UPI) -- A Canadian company says its new "balloon-boy" costumes are practically flying off the shelves in the days leading to Halloween. Plantraco Microflight, based in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, is selling the costumes online for $19.99 each, says the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. It didn't take much of a flight of fancy to dream up the idea after watching the helium-filled, flying-saucer look-alike take off from the yard of a house in Fort Collins, Colo., said Bud Kays, Plantraco Microflight's managing director. "It's a scale model of the balloon-boy's balloon," said Kays, speaking of 6-year-old Falcon Heene, who,...

UP, UP ON THE SCREEN (IN MY HELIUM BALLOON) Tune: "Up, Up and Away (In My Beautiful Balloon)" Original Would you like to hide in my helium balloon Would you ride untied in my helium balloon We'll be famous like the stars on TV, you and I For we can lie, we can lie Up, up on the screen In my helium, my helium balloon It's just a little game in my helium balloon It's fortune and it's fame in my helium balloon We can sign a deal and keep it real--no, we're not shy For we can lie, we...

I know, I know, you're asking, "What about the Pitt wedding DUFU?" Well, before we get to the gasbag that got hitched, first we need to deal with a gasbag that got UN-hitched! I refer, of course, to the Balloon Boy saga, and the DUmmies' reaction to the story. But before we hear from the DUmmies, let's join the Heene Family Singers in singing one of their favorite Ballooney Tunes: UP, UP ON THE SCREEN (IN MY HELIUM BALLOON) Tune: "Up, Up and Away (In My Beautiful Balloon)" Original Would you like to hide in my helium balloon Would...

FORT COLLINS, Colo. – A sheriff says a Colorado couple's report that their 6-year-old son was in a balloon that was hurtling away from their home was a publicity stunt. Sheriff Jim Alderden says Richard and Mayumi Heene "put on a very good show for us, and we bought it." The sheriff says no charges have been filed yet, and the parents aren't under arrest. But he says he expects to recommend charges of conspiracy and contributing to the delinquency of a minor.

FORT COLLINS, Colo. – A Colorado sheriff said he was pursuing criminal charges in the case of a 6-year-old boy who vanished into the rafters of his garage while the world thought he was zooming through the sky in a flying saucer-like helium balloon. The boy's parents, Richard and Mayumi Heene, met with Larimer County investigators for much of the afternoon, but Sheriff Jim Alderden didn't say who would be charged or what the charges would be. Alderden didn't call Thursday's hours-long drama a hoax, but he expressed disappointment that he couldn't level more serious charges in the incident, which...

Balloon dad says he has something to day according to reports

For several hours Thursday afternoon, Americans were riveted to their television sets, having been told that a 6-year-old boy might be inside an accidentally-launched homemade balloon as it soared out of control across the skies of Colorado. Today, “news” of another runaway balloon spotted in the skies above Washington, D.C., is attracting much less concern. This cartoon, from my friend David Donar at Political Graffiti, tells the story.

As the homemade balloon took to the air, Richard Heene blasts wife about tethering. • While world worried, 'balloon boy' was safe in attic http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=7e7_1255709203

The homemade balloon contraption that soared through the air in eastern Colorado for several hours is vastly different from the giant hot air balloons that are seen at festivals and that are used for recreational purposes, experts say. Nearly all the giant balloons that drift and bob through the air are hot air balloons that are filled with air and fueled by propane, explains Howard Freeman, executive producer of the Quick Chek New jersey Festival of Ballooning in Reddington, New Jersey. As the air inside the balloon heats up to a temperature higher than the outside air, the balloon rises,...

Colorado authorities met Friday morning to discuss whether they should investigate suspicions a family that claimed their six-year-old boy was trapped in an experimental, saucer-shaped ballon set up the international spectacle. Colorado authorities chased the balloon for three hours, across several counties believing the boy was trapped inside, while television cameras followed the silver balloon's every dip and dive. When the balloon finally landed in a farmer's field about 80 kilometres southeast of the boy's home in Fort Collins, Colo., they found no child inside and speculation immediately began that he may have fallen out during the flight. But Falcon...

Congratulatory messages poured into the White House this morning from global heads-of-state celebrating President Barack Obama’s dramatic rescue of a 6-year-old Colorado boy, whose apparent flight in an experimental balloon yesterday captivated viewers around the world. While the White House declined to comment on how the president could have flown to Colorado, retrieved the boy from the balloon, and returned him safely to the attic of his family home, press secretary Robert Gibbs said President Obama was “surprised and deeply humbled” by the international attention. He said the president views this latest round of global tribute as “a call to...

Speculation is mounting that the story of six-year-old American boy Falcon Heene who was feared to have floated away on a home-made weather balloon was a hoax organised by his family to gain publicity.

He just said to his parents on Wolf Blitzer “You guys said we did it for a show.” Wolf didn’t seem to notice. Video at the link.

KUSA is reporting boy is safe at home. Will try and track down a link.

Six-year-old Falcon Heene's family is described as "storm-chasing, science-obsessed Heene family from Colorado" on the show's website -- and sure enough, in the background of the family photo, there's another flying saucer.

Rescuers are tracking and chasing a "homemade flying saucer" that is in flight with a 6-year-old, by himself, on board. The incident started this morning in Fort Collins when the boy got into the balloon-like device, which was built by an adult, and it came loose from a tether, according to the Larimer County Sheriff's Office. The contraption could rise as high as 10,000 feet, the sheriff's office said. The home-made flying saucer was last seen in flight over Weld County. The sheriff's office is working the Federal Aviation Administration to determine how to best get the boy down. The...

CHECK, PLEASE! Steyn on the World Tuesday, 05 May 2009 HAPPY WARRIOR from National Review At the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden, they’re premiering a new ballet about a young French boy who’s befriended by a giant helium-filled balloon. Any balletomanes at the US embassy might be forgiven for assuming it to be some hastily concocted metaphor to Euro-American harmony in the Age of Obama: a lithe young Continental prancing around the stage enraptured by his dazzling bag of gas. But, as it happens, The Red Balloon is an adaptation of some fey French movie from the Fifties, when...

Caught on tape: A mysterious object recently filmed above Shreveport's Downtown Airport. But, there's debate tonight whether it's a UFO or just a big balloon. The video of the mysterious object came to us from local flight instructor Kevin Morris. He told us a fellow pilot, Charles Corder, captured the images back on Thursday, October 9th at 10:30 in morning, while using his home video camera. We slowed down the video to get a better view and remove much of the shaking. Morris said he's been told it hovered about 10-thousand feet in the air and appeared about 80-feet long....

Has any one else noticed the responses this morning from across the pond? Wow, she has really struck a chord.

California state Sen. Jack Scott says he didn't intend to "be a party pooper." It's just that helium-filled foil balloons -- like those found at hospital gift shops and office parties -- are dangerous. They float into electric lines and cause power outages, more than 800 in California last year, utilities say. He drafted a bill to ban foil balloons; it sailed through the state Senate and now awaits a vote in the Assembly. ***** The pro-balloon people are hoping that even if the bill does pass, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will veto it. At a recent news conference, the governor...

Brazilian officials are examining a body which was found floating in the Atlantic Ocean, amid fears that it is the Brazilian priest who went missing after taking off under a raft of party balloons in April. Father Adelir de Carli was blown out to sea when trying to set a record for flying with hundreds of helium-filled balloons. Workers on a tugboat operated by Brazil's state run oil company Petrobras discovered the body about 100 kilometres out to sea at the weekend. Authorities say that pieces of fabric found with the body are consistent with the clothes Fr Carli was...

(CNN) -- French skydiver Michel Fournier's bid for a record-breaking parachute jump from Earth's stratosphere was aborted Tuesday when the balloon that was to carry him into the far reaches of the sky slipped away from his flight crew. The former paratrooper had hoped to set new records for the highest jump, fastest free fall, longest free fall and the highest altitude reached by a man in a balloon. But those hopes drifted away over the plains of Saskatchewan when the balloon escaped. Still clad in his bright yellow pressure suit, the visibly frustrated Fournier waved away cameras after his...

Japanese balloon bombs: A forgotten history Posted: May 2, 2008 10:47 PM CDT Balloon bombs, sent aloft by Japanese during WWII, reached West Coast, and one proved deadly With hundreds never recovered, still a rare chance of risky encounter By Christian Boris, KTVZ.COM In 1944 and 1945, the Japanese military launched bomb-carrying balloons to strike the American homeland. Many balloons landed in Oregon, including one that killed six people in Klamath County. On May 5, 1945, a group of Sunday school students encountered a balloon bomb snagged in a tree near Bly in Klamath County. Thirteen-year-old Joan Patzke attempted to...

A Roman Catholic priest who used 1,000 helium balloons to try to break a flying record has gone missing off the southern coast of Brazil. Rev Adelir de Carli lifted off from the port city of Paranagua on Sunday, equipped with a parachute, thermal suit, satellite phone and a GPS device. A sea and air rescue operation is under way after he lost contact with port authority officials late on Sunday. He wanted to break a 19-hour record for the most hours flying with balloons. As well as his GPS and satellite phone, Rev Carli was equipped with a buoyant...

Hajji, of Hackney, east London, had concealed a 6,000-pound engagement ring inside a helium balloon. The idea was that she would pop the balloon as he popped the question. But as he left the shop, a gust of wind pulled the balloon from his hand and he watched the ring -- and quite possibly the affections of his girlfriend -- sailing away over the rooftops.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — The basket of a hot air balloon tipped after the craft got stuck, sending a woman on a 60- to 70-foot fall to her death Monday, state police said. The balloon snagged a fiber-optic line running above a power line about 8 a.m. during an annual balloon festival. The pilot threw down a tether to a pickup truck on the ground to reel the balloon down and free it, state police spokesman Andrew Tingwall said. But the tether broke, and the balloon flew back up, causing its gondola to tip and the woman to fall to...

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - The basket of a hot air balloon tipped after the craft got stuck, sending a female passenger on a 60- to 70-foot fall to her death Monday, state police said. The balloon snagged a fiberoptic line running above a power line about 8 a.m. during an annual balloon festival. The pilot threw down a tether to a pickup truck on the ground to reel the balloon down and free it, state police spokesman Andrew Tingwall said. But the tether broke, and the balloon flew back up, causing its gondola to tip and the woman to fall to...

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (1010 WINS) -- A hot air balloon burst into flames over western Canada, burning a woman and her adult daughter to death while their families looked on, officials said Saturday. Other passengers leaped to the ground, some with their clothes in flames, witnesses said. Eleven passengers were seriously injured when the balloon crashed Friday evening in a recreational vehicle park near the U.S border in Surrey, British Columbia, a suburb of Vancouver. There were 12 passengers and a pilot on board, police and witnesses said. John Kageorge, who works for Fantasy Balloon Charters, said the fire started...

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - A hot air balloon caught fire over western Canada, forcing screaming passengers to leap to the ground, some with their clothes in flames, witnesses said. Two people died and 11 were seriously injured, police said Saturday. There were 12 passengers and a pilot on board when the balloon crashed Friday evening in a recreational vehicle park in Surrey, British Columbia, a suburb of Vancouver, police and witnesses said. All but two of the people on the balloon were initially located and taken to area hospitals with serious but non-life threatening injuries, police said. Royal Canadian Mounted...

MILAN, Italy (AP) - It would take one very large fig leaf to restore modesty to Milan's main park after the installation of a 70-foot floating sculpture of a naked man. The balloon self-portrait by Polish artist Pawel Althamer has been hovering outside the Renaissance Palazzina Appiani in Parco Sempione since Monday, drawing second takes, amused looks and some reprobation about exposing children to nudity. [snip] "This wouldn't fly in the U.S.," observed 31-year-old American Adriana Spatafora, an English language teacher passing by.

I just came across this link to what must one of the more extreme forms of Star Wars fandom to extrude itself onto the Internet in recent memory: A hot air balloon in the shape of Darth Vader's helmet. (Via SciFi Tech and Boing Boing.) It was created by a mad Belgian inventor named Benoit Lambert, who, according to StarWars.com, received permission from Lucasfilm to build the balloon as long as it was used for non-commercial activities. It can carry two passengers and a pilot. There's no indication of when Lambert will build a lighter-than-air Death Star. That's all fine,...

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - For the next 10 days, the skies above Albuquerque will be filled with floating color as hundreds of balloons are launched as part of the city's annual International Balloon Fiesta. This year's events at the park will feature balloon glows, flying competitions, live music, a wine festival, wood carving competitions and a breakfast burrito eating contest — complete with the state's infamous green chili. But the main draw still remains the mass ascensions — the liftoffs of hundreds of balloons each morning from the park. Thousands of fiesta visitors can interact with balloon pilots and crews on...

Julian Nott and Jim Woodman tested their theory that manned smoke balloons of cotton and reed not only controlled these designs but may also have been used for ceremonial/religious festivals in which important members of the society who had died were transported on a ritualistic journey to the sun, the god they worshipped... "To our surprise," says Nott, "the quality of the smoke was crucial. Modern historians--laughing at the Montgolfiers, who believed that what was being burned to heat the balloon was important--claim that all that mattered was the heat. However, this balloon showed that it is essential to have...

LOS ANGELES – An unmanned, inflatable spacecraft launched by a Las Vegas real estate mogul on Thursday beamed back the first images since it slipped into orbit and expanded itself. Genesis I sent back several photos taken by its dozen cameras showing sections of the craft, according to its builder Bigelow Aerospace. The company declined to publicly release the images. The experimental spacecraft rocketed into space Wednesday from Russia on a mission to test technology that could be used to build an inflatable commercial space station. Genesis I was healthy with functional onboard computers, solar panels, battery power and pressure...

Winter air temperatures over Antarctica have risen by more than 2C in the last 30 years, a new study shows.Research published in the US journal Science says the warming is seen across the whole of the continent and much of the Southern Ocean. The study questions the reliability of current climate models that fail to simulate the temperature rise. In addition, the scientists from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) say the cause of the warming is not clear. It could be linked to increases in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere or natural variations in Antarctica's climate system. Scientists are keen...

Look! It's a Bird, It's a Plane…It's an LG Cell Phone? LG Electronics announced Thursday its plans for a "2006 European Balloon Tour" for its major business partners in Europe as part of its marketing aimed at the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) market in Europe. A large LG mobile phone-shaped air balloon floats along as part of the LG Electronics' "2006 European Balloon Tour" in Chateau d'Oex in Switzerland on Thursday./Yonhap LG Electronics will invite its major European business partners from Britain, France, Germany, and Switzerland and entice them with an array of perks including a catered...

Below is what I just sent via email to the editors of the Washington ComPost. And I ask the same question to everyone in FR land - why should I report anything when no one seems to take it serious?

Indian millionaire Vijaypat Singhania today broke the world record for the highest flight in a hot air balloon, reaching the fringes of space, his son claimed. Singhania, 67, hit 21,000 metres a little more than two hours after taking off in his 40-tonne balloon, and has started his descent, his son Gautam said. "We have the world record at 69,000 feet" (21,000 metres), said Gautam Singhania. "We're bringing him down now." The previous world record was 19,811 metres, set by Sweden's Per Lindstrand in Plano, Texas, in June 1988. Singhania lifted off from downtown Bombay at 6.45am (1215 AEDT) enclosed...

November 24, 2005 2 Sisters Injured as Parade Balloon Crashes Into Lamppost By SEWELL CHAN A giant balloon in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade, swinging out of control in sudden bursts of wind, struck a light pole in the heart of Times Square today, injuring two spectators and scaring scores of others in an eerie replay of a 1997 accident that had prompted pledges of safety reforms. The M&M balloon, a 515-pound plastic contraption filled with 13,335 cubic feet of helium, began to list erratically as it entered Times Square around 11:40 a.m., witnesses said, before it crashed into a...