January 2000
andfreshoceanairareingredientsfor
paradise. But throw in brisk breezes, mol-
tenlava,sharpvolcanicrockandthick
jungles,andHawaiisuddenlydoesn’t
soundlike the best place to fly a balloon.
BalloonistRobertMichaelspends
half the year in Boulder, CO and the other
halfinHawaii.Buthe’sneverthought
about bringing his balloonto the islands.
“You might beableto,but why would
you wantto?” hesaid. “There’snotthat
many roads for access. Pickup couldbe a
serious problem.”
Withtradewindsthatseemtobe
constantlyblowing,“youstartrunning
out of optionsreal fast,” he said.
Perhapsthefirstballoontoflyin
Hawaii was in the ‘70s,whenSidCutter
said hewashired bythe CoastGuardto
help place markers and a corona ring, sort
of a lightning rod for a cable. His mission:
totether 1,600 feet toinstallthe markers
for a submarine navigation station. Heli-
copters hadcrashedattempting todo the
same thing, he said.
“It rains like 200 inches in that valley
a year,” Cutter said. “It was a pretty hairy
deal.”
The last balloon in Hawaii was prob-
ably Christmas of 1998, when Steve Fos-
sett, Per Lindstrand and Richard Branson
endedaglobalattemptbyditching10
milesnorth of Oahu.
Last summer, Larry Wimberley,who
crewed for balloonists in North Carolina,
got transferred to an Army base on Oahu.
He hasn’tseena balloonsince.
“Unfortunately,it’stoowindyand
too wet,” he said. “There’s a lot of rain in
Hawaii. I haven’t heard of aballoon here.”
ButHawaiioncehadanactivebal-
loonist.ItwaschancethatHalleLadd-
visitedfamilyinNewMexico
during the Albuquerque rallyin1981.
“We hadgone there ona stop on our
honeymoontomeetherfamilyandhit
Albuquerqueonthe firstdayofFiesta,”
said her husband, Mike Galvin. “We had
never seena balloon.”
Halle wasterrified of heights and of
butreturnedthefollowingyear
andtookaballoonride.“Theyhada
horrificlanding,they hit hard and I thought
this will cure her,” Galvin said. When she
finally managedto crawl outof the gon-
dola, she said she wanted to learn to fly. “I
thoughtthere’s nodoubt aboutit, she hit
her head,” he said.
Halle tookballoonlessonsinAlbu-
querquewithSidCutterandbroughta
multi-colored Raven Rally back with her
toher home inKailua-Kona, onthe Big
Island of Hawaii. She named itAnuenue,
which means rainbow in Hawaiian. Now,
Island, whichis about100 miles across.
“Wefounda placethatwassortof
viable,aflatareabetweentwoofthe
mountains,” Galvinsaid. Theshelter of-
fered protection from the nearly continual
winds.
“Weflewoversomeofthemost
beautiful cattle pasture land in the world,”
he said. “It’s an area that gets quite a bit of
rain- it’slush, rich and green.”
Beingpioneer balloonists inHawaii
meant a lot of trial and error, Galvin said.
“Yourunoutof island,that’stheprob-
lem,” hesaid. Windsonceblew the bal-
loon out to sea, but Halleeventually found
winds to bring her backinland, although
the landingoptionswere poor.
“You never get the ability to steer the
balloonbecause wehave tradewindsthat
always blow in onedirection,” Galvin said.
Alloftheirflightswereatdawn,
whicharenearlyalwaysclear.Several
landings ended in trees or on sharp volca-
nic rock which meant the balloon needed
to berepaired before its next flight.Galvin
said90percentof theflightsresultedin
gentle landings. Butoncewhile chasing
duringanextremelywindyflight,he
watched the basket drag from the edge of
a pasture onto vicious lava rock.
“Ihadrelativesofthepassengers
withme andI prepared themfor the fact
therewouldprobablybebloodandthe
possibilityof brokenbone,” Galvin said.
“Miraculouslythepeoplewereshaken,
butnothurt.Buttheoakskidsonthe
basketlookedliketheywentthrougha
meatgrinder.”
Ballooninggetsevencostlierwhen
thenearestrepairstationismorethan
2,000 miles away. “Our problem was get-
tinga planethat hada big enough cargo
January 2000
Honolulu by boat, then put it on a 747 to
the mainland.” Cost of shipping the bal-
loonto be repaired was about$1,200 and
soon became cost-prohibitive. A round-
trip ticket from California to Hawaiithen
was about $800. “Itwas cheaper to bring
someone tous tofix the balloonthansend
the balloon out,” he said.
With nature and logisticsseemingly
against ballooning inHawaii, more prob-
lems came.Galvin, as well as pilots in
Alaska, found themselves without insur-
anceduring an insurance crisis around
1985.
“Weflew no passengers, no people, just
ourselves with no insurance,” Galvin said.
After a couple years of shipping her
Halle boughta basket onthe mainland
and just shipped the envelope. The rain-
bowballoon was eventually replaced by a
maroon one with “Hawaii” emblazoned
on it and “Aloha” on the other.
“Tothe best of myknowledge, we
were the onlyballoonthatflewon the
islands,” Galvin said. Sadly, Halledied of
cancer in 1994.
Corporate balloons have been in Ha-
waii to tetherduring theIronman Triathlon
competitions,andGloKehoeof Albu-
qu erqu et eth ered —o rat temp tedt o
tether—the Sears balloon in brisk winds
inthreemallparkinglotsonOahuin
1986. “It was not fun,” she said. “They
were pretty breezy.”
None
Events:None
•
Someone once tried to start a balloon
ride business at a small vineyard in Maui.
It lasted about a year, Galvin said. “They
tried it for a business. We did it for fun,”
he said.
Galvin recalls what was supposed to
be the inaugural flight of another balloon.
“Inthe ‘80s in Oahu, a balloon company
wantedtodorides,”he said.“Theyhad
the press there and the balloontied off to
twostreetlampsandaguardrail.The
wind came upandrippedthe balloonoff
its tether. The pilot had stepped out and it
freeflewabout14milesandslammed
intothe side of the mountain.”
That was theend of that enterprise, he
said.
