This incident happened yesterday, 02/28, so obviously no longer an active incident. This was well out of my listening area, but would have been very interesting had I been in range.
A hot air balloon struck a tall cell tower. Two occupants in the balloon's basket were trapped at just over 900' feet up. Local fire, with assistance from multiple sources had to extricate the balloon's passengers and safely get them to the ground. Here's a YouTube clip from a local TV station on the rescue. Multiple other videos can be found via a Google search using "longview texas hot air balloon" or here. Fox Weather has a clip showing the occupants being moved from the basket to the tower. Lengthy clip here regarding agencies involved in the rescue. Apparently, 14 responders climbed the tower, stringing multiple sections of rope together in order to extricate the balloon passengers and safely lower them to the ground. Unfortunately, unless I overlooked one, there is no archived audio to playback.
A hot air balloon struck a tall cell tower. Two occupants in the balloon's basket were trapped at just over 900' feet up. Local fire, with assistance from multiple sources had to extricate the balloon's passengers and safely get them to the ground. Here's a YouTube clip from a local TV station on the rescue. Multiple other videos can be found via a Google search using "longview texas hot air balloon" or here. Fox Weather has a clip showing the occupants being moved from the basket to the tower. Lengthy clip here regarding agencies involved in the rescue. Apparently, 14 responders climbed the tower, stringing multiple sections of rope together in order to extricate the balloon passengers and safely lower them to the ground. Unfortunately, unless I overlooked one, there is no archived audio to playback.
