Balloonmeister

"I was skiing in Aspen, Colorado and saw two balloons tethered on a rugby field and I just sat down in awe!" This was Bill Bussey’s first exposure to hot air ballooning... it would not be his last. A few months later (April) there was an arts festival in his hometown of Longview, Texas. Bussey had heard they planned to have a balloon there. "It turned out to be the balloon of another Texan, Terry Cooper of nearby Tyler." Cooper and two partners offered Bussey a fourth interest in the balloon for $2,500. Bussey quickly rounded up another enthusiast to buy another "fourth." "We figured out they wanted $5,000 dollars from us for a share of their balloon and we could buy a new one for not much more than that." So together, in the Spring of 1978, Bussey and three others bought a brand new balloon, his first.

Bussey’s investment was $300 as a down payment and a $120 monthly payment. That $420 is the only personal money Bussey says he has ever spent on balloons. He immediately began selling rides, at $30 each, with the goal of selling just four a month, "so I could make that payment," he says. His ballooning interest has been self supporting ever since. It wasn’t long though before his partners complained he was flying the balloon too much and bought out his interest. Of that original foursome, only Bussey remains in ballooning today.

Nearly two decades later, Bussey has logged some 2,200 hours as pilot in command of a balloon. He has achieved success in every niche of the sport. As a sport pilot he has won championships too numerous to list; as a commercial pilot he has maintained a steady, successful relationship with the Schlitz Brewing Company flying balloons representing three of their products, Strohs, Old Milwaukee and Schlitz. As an instructor he can name among his students his brother Bruce, himself an accomplished commercial and competition pilot. Today in Longview he continues to run a successful balloon ride business, Balloon Adventures, USA, but the cost has increased slightly from that original fee of $30. He is the founder of The Great Texas Balloon Race where he is credited with originating balloon glows as a spectator event. He has been honored by the BFA, the NAA, the FAI and the AIBF. Including the four world records and ten national records claimed in his most recent flight of SkyQuest 5, he has 13 world records and 28 national records in balloons.

After all of this, what does he consider his most outstanding accomplishment? "It would have to be this most recent record flight," he says, quickly adding, "but I thought that about my previous record flight (in a 105)." Sitting and talking with the man many know as ‘Doctor Bill’ you get the sense that his most outstanding accomplishment is yet to come. He has tremendous confidence in his abilities, but admits he learns from everyone all the time. Over the years he has never lost the ability to laugh at himself, like when telling the story of his first record attempt. After extensive preparation and planning, he and his team arrive at the launch site and set about their task-only to learn that he has forgotten something very important-the balloon’s envelope!

Though he has accomplished much in his career there is one honor missing from the trophy room-a US National Championship. Two years ago it was his to win, but an error in declaring a target too close to powerlines and the resultant penalty to his score kept the elusive championship from his grasp.

"It remains a goal for me, it is the ultimate goal and to me it is even more important than a World Championship," confides Bussey. "The non- balloonist would think the World Championship more important. But the United States has the most competitive pilots in the world and winning the nationals for me would far exceed a world title as far as show-casing your ability to fly a balloon.

"It’s anybody’s goal who goes there and [for me] it is a realistic goal. However, I don’t find that it is as important for me to win it today as it used to be. I used to live and breathe winning the national championship. I still want to win it and will make every effort to win it, but... if I don’t win a national championship, I’m going to be okay. I don’t want to say I’ve lost the drive to win the championship, but the fact that I’m answering this question this way may mean that I have. I hope not. I know this, I’ll be banging heads with the best of them come this August!"

If the national championship has slipped a notch or two from his list of goals still to be attained, another perhaps even more noble has replaced it, to give back to the sport that has given him so much.

"I hope that I’m beginning to give back something," he says, "but even that is an ongoing process, one that I am learning more and more about every day."

If the past is an eye to the future, and Bussey learns to give back as well as he has learned everything else since that day on an Aspen ski slope, the sport of ballooning has much to look forward to.

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS



1978	1st Balloon Flight

1986	1st World Record Flight

1988	AIBF Spirit of Fiesta Award

1988	#1 ranked pilot-NBRA

1989	#1 ranked pilot-BFA

1990	Bronze Medal-North American Championships

1993	NAA Award - One of Ten Most Memorable Flights

1994	BFA Shields-Trauger Award

1994	Al Desmond Award for Competition Ballooning

1985, 88, 95	Member US World Ballooning Team

		13 World Records, 28 US National Records