13 Nov 2011: CAMERON BALLOONS A-315 — NAPA VALLEY BALLOONS INC

13 Nov 2011: CAMERON BALLOONS A-315 — NAPA VALLEY BALLOONS INC

No fatalities • Vacaville, CA, United States

Probable cause

The balloon’s encounter with increased wind, which resulted in a hard landing and passenger injury.

— NTSB Determination

Accident narrative

The pilot and his passengers were on a local area flight in a hot air balloon. Prior to departure, the pilot conducted a preflight orientation for the passengers which included proper positioning in the basket during landing. Upon departure the winds were from the south at 5 knots. During landing, the pilot noted that the winds had increased to 10 knots. The balloon's descent rate near the surface was 30 feet per minute. Upon contact with the ground, the balloon basket slid approximately 40 to 50 feet before impacting a 6 to 8-inch curb. The basket stopped abruptly and fell over. One of the passengers sustained a broken leg during the landing. The pilot's ground crew reported that the passenger was not against the downwind basket side at the time of ground contact. The pilot indicated that prior to departure, he will now require passengers to demonstrate their landing positioning so that he can ensure their understanding.

Contributing factors

  • cause Airspeed — Not attained/maintained
  • Effect on operation

Conditions

Weather
VMC, wind 010/04kt, vis 7sm

Loading the flight search…

What you can do on Flight Finder

  • Search flights between any two airports with live fares.
  • By aircraft — pick a plane model (e.g. Boeing 787, Airbus A350) and see every route it flies from your origin.
  • Route map — click any airport worldwide to explore its destinations, or draw a radius to find nearby airports.
  • Global aviation safety — aviation accident database, 5,200+ records since 1980, with map and rankings by aircraft and operator.
  • NTSB safety feed — recent U.S. aviation accidents and incidents from the official NTSB CAROL database, updated daily.

Frequently asked questions

How do I search flights by aircraft type on FlightFinder?

Pick an aircraft model — Boeing 737, Airbus A320, A380, Boeing 787 Dreamliner and more — enter your origin airport, and FlightFinder shows every route that plane flies from there with live fares.

Which aircraft types can I filter by?

We support Boeing 737/747/757/767/777/787, the full Airbus A220/A319/A320/A321/A330/A340/A350/A380 family, Embraer E170/E175/E190/E195, Bombardier CRJ and Dash 8, and the ATR 42/72 turboprops.

Is FlightFinder free to use?

Search and schedules are free. Pro ($4.99/month, $39/year, or $99 one-time lifetime) unlocks the enriched flight card — on-time stats, CO₂ per passenger, amenities, live gate & weather — plus My Trips with push alerts.

Where does the route data come from?

Live schedules come from Amadeus, AeroDataBox and Travelpayouts. Observed routes (which aircraft actually flew a given city pair) are crowdsourced from adsb.lol ADS-B data under the Open Database License.