Balloon’s bumpy landing ends breezy ride

No one is injured when balloon comes down in a West Slope community garden

Pamplin Media Group, Jun 18, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (1 Reader comment)

Courtesy of WCSO

Randall Fuehrer’s Thunder and Colt balloon, “Magic,” inset, came down in a West Slope community garden Thursday morning after a short, windy ride from Tigard’s Cook Park, where it launched from the Allstate Festival of Balloons. No one was injured and the garden was not damaged by the “stand-up landing.”

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McMinnville balloon pilot Randall Fuehrer’s Thursday morning began with a gentle lift in Tigard’s Cook Park and ended with a bumpity bump in a West Slope-area community garden.

Fuehrer’s Thunder and Colt AX8-90 hot air balloon cut short a planned morning flight through parts of Washington County when the wind picked up speed and forced him to land. There were three people in the balloon’s basket – Fuehrer and two friends – and no one was injured in the “stand-up landing” that bumped along the weeds near the garden plots.

“Not every one of our landings is a velvet touch landing,” Fuehrer said. “We don’t have landing gear, we have a wooden floor and a basket. We tend to bounce around a bit sometimes.”

Fuehrer’s balloon was one of three launched at about 7:46 a.m. Thursday from the 25th Allstate Festival of Balloons in Tigard. They are among nearly two dozen balloons that will be part of the three-day festival beginning Friday.

His balloon, nicknamed “Magic,” floated toward a planned landing spot at either Washington Square shopping center or the Red Tail Golf Course on Southwest Scholls Ferry Road.

Fuehrer told Washington County sheriff’s deputies that he was having trouble completing the flight because of wind speed and direction. At one point, the balloon was up to about 1,000 feet, and the wind became stronger, pushing him toward an alternate landing area.

“I was flying in a situation where I saw the wind start to pick up so I was trying to land it safely,” said Fuehrer, who operates the Outback Balloon LLC company in McMinnville.

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