Posted on 10/15/2009 11:45:55 AM PDT by Arec Barrwin
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 homemade airplane was tethered in Fort Collins when the boy got onboard and it floated away. (Lisa Ecklund via 9News)
The six-year-old boy was by himself on board the hommade aircraft. (Courtesy Lisa Ecklund, via 9News)
The craft could fly as high as 10,000 feet, according to the Weld County Sheriff's Office. (Lisa Ecklund via 9News)
"You can't always get what you want."
Funny you said that, because as I watched this unfold (still in flight) I fantasized about how the ancient aircraft would probably be great - slow speed, fly low, minimal gusting from the props and horizontal instead of vertical (helos), and still controlled manned flight. Get a Wright or Curtiss out there!
And there could be a parallel universe where the boy is in the balloon...and still ascending!
Somewhere on the thread they said they were home schooled. Looks like they had too much time on their hands.
I assume you are using this information to try and discredit the boy's claim that they thought he was on the 'ship'.
Hindsight is always 20/20. Would you have immediately called off the rescue squads following the 'ship' based on some technical advice? If you had it at the instant this all started? What if you turned out wrong?
There were 20-25 mph winds, with higher gusts. I have seen planes that were tied to stakes buried in concrete take off and fly (albeit not very far).
Part of the reason that we homeschool is to give our kids a little time on their hands to explore what they want to explore. So many kids need a blackberry to organize their day.
Of course, I told my kids that if any of them ever let our 20 foot helium balloon loose and then hid in the attic, then I will kill them to make an example of them for the other children! LOL!
Where are your numbers? Ir;s been more than 1 hour...
LOL!!! That is too funny!
There still crunching the numbers.
They’re ....lol
Also, the dad instead of calling 911 immeditely to locate his boy, called the FAA. Strange?
He just said to his parents on Wolf Blitzer “You guys said we did it for a show.” Wolf didn’t seem to notice.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI6UONWCq7A
20’ diam => 3.14*20^2 = 1257 sqft
5’ ht => 1257*5 = 6283 cu ft *28.32 L/cuft = 177940 L
(It’s a cylinder, essentially.)
2.205 lb/kg
If 1 L lifts 1 gram, then
(177940 L * 1g * 1kg * 2.205 lb)/(1 L * 1000g * 1kg) = 392.36 lbs
Now, what the structure weighs, I don’t know; but if the man wanted it to float, it’d better weigh alot less than 392 lb!
And BTW by these factors, a 20’ sphere could lift 2093 lbs.
Not unless you are insisting on finding it strange. Did he know his son was missing at that point? He called the FAA to report that his balloon was released into the air. Makes perfect sense. Within minutes, 911 was called
My husband suggested tying the “UFO” in with LOOTER GUY.
OH WOW! The mom said “no” to him. The dad seemed to ignore it.
Our local news reported that there was no school today.
I had a rule when they turned 18, I worked afternoons at the hospital, got home at midnight and went to bed a 2am...The boys had a key to the bottom lock, but not the top lock....Only hubby and I had that key...If you were not home by 2, sleep in your car.....I would lock the top lock. you best not wake either of us up.....She is the youngest of 5. Has 4 older brothers.....Glad I didn't know all the stuff that went on...
The kids were at home for a teacher workday.
This article does a good job of explaining what happened. I am sure some on here still say it was all one big scam, but I am inclined to believe the cops here who probably have a knack for telling whether it was BS or not.
Apparently the older boy thought he was still in the balloon because the dad scolded the younger son for getting in the basket earlier. The younger son ran off and hid, and that’s when they thought he was in the balloon when it went off.
“A 6-year-old boy was found hiding in a cardboard box in his family’s garage Thursday after being feared aboard a homemade helium balloon that hurtled 50 miles through the sky on live television.
The discovery marked a bizarre end to a saga that started when the giant silvery balloon floated away from the family’s yard Thursday morning, sparking a frantic rescue operation that involved military helicopters and briefly halted some departures from Denver International Airport.
Then, more than two hours after the balloon gently touched down in a field with no sign of the boy, Sheriff Jim Alderden turned to reporters during a news conference, gave a thumbs up and said 6-year-old Falcon Heene was “at the house.”
“Apparently he’s been there the whole time,” he said.
The boy’s father, Richard Heene, said the family was tinkering with the balloon Thursday and that he scolded Falcon for getting inside a compartment on the craft.
He said Falcon’s brother saw him inside the compartment and that’s why they thought he was aboard the balloon when it launched.
But the boy had fled to the garage, climbing a pole into the rafters and hiding in a cardboard box, at some point after the scolding. He was never in the balloon during its two-hour, 50-mile journey through two counties. “I yelled at him. I’m really sorry I yelled at him,” Heene said, choking up and hugging Falcon to him during a news conference.
“I was in the attic and he scared me because he yelled at me,” Falcon said. “That’s why I went in the attic.”
Heene said the balloon wasn’t tethered properly, and “it was a mishap. I’m not going to lay blame on anybody.”
The boys’ parents are storm chasers who appeared twice in the ABC reality show “Wife Swap,” most recently in March.
Richard Heene adamantly denied the notion that the whole thing was a big publicity stunt. “That’s horrible after the crap we just went through. No.”
The sheriff said he would meet with investigators on Friday to see if the case warranted further investigation.
“As this point there’s no indication that this was a hoax,” Alderden said.
The flying saucer-like craft tipped precariously at times before gliding to the ground in a dirt field 12 miles northeast of Denver International Airport. Sheriff’s deputies secured it to keep it in place, tossing shovelfuls of dirt on one edge.
With the child nowhere in sight, investigators searched the balloon’s path. Several people reported seeing something fall from the craft while it was in the air, and yellow crime-scene tape was placed around the home.
Neighbor Bob Licko, 65, said he was leaving home when he heard commotion in the backyard of the family. He said he saw two boys on the roof with a camera, commenting about their brother.
“One of the boys yelled to me that his brother was way up in the air,” Licko said.
Licko said the boy’s mother seemed distraught and that the boy’s father was running around the house.
Licko said he didn’t believe any hoax was involved.
“Based on what I witnessed in the backyard in the morning with the parents, I don’t think that’s the case,” Licko said. “They’re better actors than I thought they were if that’s the case.”
In a 2007 interview with The Denver Post, Richard Heene described becoming a storm chaser after a tornado ripped off a roof where he was working as a contractor and said he once flew a plane around Hurricane Wilma’s perimeter in 2005.
Pursuing bad weather was a family activity with the children coming along as the father sought evidence to prove his theory that rotating storms create their own magnetic fields.
Although Richard said he has no specialized training, they had a computer tracking system in their car and a special motorcycle.
While the balloon was airborne, Colorado Army National Guard sent a UH-58 Kiowa helicopter and a Black Hawk UH-60 to try to rescue the boy, possibly by lowering someone to the balloon. They also were working with pilots of ultralight aircraft on the possibility of putting weights on the homemade craft to weigh it down.
Alderden said he didn’t have an estimate of how much the search cost. Capt. Troy Brown said the Black Hawk helicopter was in the air for nearly three hours, and the Kiowa helicopter was airborne for about one hour. The Black Hawk costs about $4,600 an hour to fly, and the Kiowa is $700 an hour, Brown said.
Col. Chris Petty, one of the pilots aboard the Black Hawk, said he was thrilled the boy was OK.
Asked what he would say to the 6-year-old if he saw him, Petty said: “I’m really glad you’re alive, I’m very thankful, but I’d sure like to know the rest of the story.”
The episode led to a brief shutdown of northbound departures from one of the nation’s busiest airports between 1 p.m. and 1:15 p.m. MDT, said Lyle Burrington, the National Air Traffic Controllers Association representative at the Federal Aviation Administration’s radar center in Longmont, Colo. The balloon was about 15 miles northwest of the airport at that time.
Before the departure shutdown, controllers had been routing planes away from the balloon, Burrington said.
The Poudre School District in Fort Collins, where the boys attend, did not have classes for elementary schools Thursday because of a teacher work day.
Jason Humbert said he was in a field checking on an oil well when he found himself surrounded by police who had been chasing the balloon.
“It looked like an alien spaceship you see in those old, old movies. You know, those black-and-white ones. It came down softly,” Humbert said. “I asked a police officer if the boy was OK and he said there was no one in it.”
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