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IMPORTANT WEATHER INFORMATION !!
A few words about weather—
We at AGABC are only interested about safety!
Weather is our number one concern!!!!
- Often people will say, “It is a beautiful day why aren’t we flying?” The criterion we use to determine whether or not we are flying is as follows—
We use NOAA Aviation weather. We will call the passengers out if all surrounding locations to the balloon port are giving reports of surface winds of less than 7 mph, no fronts, no storms, no rain, and no jet stream in the area or within 100 miles. Also, the winds at 3000 feet must be less then 17mph.
- If the above criteria is met then we will call the passengers out and they MUST meet at the designated location ON TIME!!! Ballooning is time critical so that we can drive to the launch site and set up the balloon etc. We must be in the air by a certain time to have a successful flight. This is determined by sunrise and sunset and can’t be controlled by personal schedules or traffic problems. If the weather changes before the flight we will try to notify the passengers before they drive to the designated location. The place and time for the flight will be on the recording which you must call after 7:30 pm for a morning flight and after 1:30 pm for an evening flight. JUST BECAUSE WE CALL YOU OUT IT DOES NOT MEAN WE ARE FLYING!!! Yes!! The forecast is only a forecast and until we get out and check the weather ourselves! We don’t know if the forecast was correct. Some of the ways we do this---
- Watch the tops of trees, wind on lakes, flags, and listen to sounds to see if there are wind distortions.
- Inflate and let a helium balloon go up to see how fast and consistent it tracks.
We have been doing this many years and experience goes a long way. Even if we see other balloons fly it does not mean we are flying!!!!!! Repeat...Even if we see other balloons flying it does not mean we are flying!!!! In ballooning there are those that will try to fly in anything! We have seen them come and have seen them go!!! (i.e. crash) For many it is a macho thing to fly in lots of wind and in our opinion it is foolish. Many of these pilots are sport pilots and do not have the experience to fly a commercial flight. If you would like to fly with one of these pilots please let us know and we can try to make the arrangements for you!!!!
EL NINO or LA NINA??
Since 2005 the weather has been very temperamental to say the least! In 2005 with Katrina and other notable hurricanes the balloon flying weather was great here in the US. The pattern since 2005 has been an El Nino weather pattern which causes fronts to race across the country with very little stability. In 2008 we saw 100 year rain records broken, 2009 had the coldest and wettest summer the Midwest has ever experienced. In 2010 New York City had 3 feet of snow, Key West had the coldest winter ever, Vancouver had to ship in snow for the Olympics etc., etc. The recent long range forecast is that the El Nino pattern is changing and that we expect a more normal weather pattern this summer which should be good for ballooning.
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