The Hot-air Balloon accident at Luxor

The Rennie couple were enthusiastic about a hot-air balloon trip in their holiday plans and they talked enthusiastically about it to their neighbors  They were in the Balloon that ended in disaster near Luxor in Egypt. Tragically Mrs Rennie died on the spot and her husband Michael miraculously survived and is in hospital. The trip consisted of 21 persons of which only two persons escaped though with injuries. The balloon was descending after the trip  and when it was just 3 meter above ground it caught fire.  Two persons jumped out of it immediately with minor injuries. The fire heated the air inside the ‘envelop’ or Balloon and it started to climb up again rapidly. At that time people started to jump out of it and by then it had gained an altitude of a 7 storey building and soon it exploded presumably the Gas caught fire and triggered the explosion. The persons died by jumping and the explosion.

A balloon that carries 20 persons is fairly big and there are various types of them with different seating capacity. Unlike travelling in Air-craft or Helicopter the flight in a Balloon is silent, exhilarating and in tune with the nature and tourists find it an experience to cherish. So there is no dearth of persons for a balloon trip. The balloon that killed 19 persons belonged to travel company Thomas Cook. They have a large fleet of Balloons and presently   all of them have been grounded following the accident and an enquiry is on.   

The balloons are as dangerous as any Air craft or Helicopter as they are capable of soaring to an altitude of 300 meters or more. The accident at Egypt proves it. The mechanism of Balloons is elementary and simple, when the air inside the balloons is heated the air loses its density and the atmospheric air outside lifts the balloon up. To bring the Balloon down the temperature inside the Balloon is brought down by opening the upper side sufficiently as desired.

To go for sideways the wind has to help. So to reach a designed destination the wind current has to be checked before the journey. The Balloons are therefore used mostly for recreation by the tourists and it certainly needs courage to float at such an altitude in the sky.