Nobody injured after balloon crashes into AM radio tower in North Valley

A hot air balloon crashed into a radio tower Friday morning west of Balloon Fiesta Park, toppling the tower and knocking a popular AM station off the air.

Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta spokesman Tom Garrity said the pilot and two passengers “landed safely and without incident.”

Meanwhile, KKOB 770 AM radio was off the air after its 800-foot tower was reduced to a twisted heap of white and red metal beams in a dirt lot in the North Valley.

“We’re obviously happy that no one was injured in the balloon or on the ground,” Jeff Berry, vice president for Cumulus Media Albuquerque, which runs KKOB, told the Journal. “That was our first concern.”

He said Cumulus has a plan in place to possibly have the AM station back on air in the next 24 to 48 hours, but a “few things have to happen between now and then.”

The balloon involved, “Blue Moon,” is operated by pilot Dan Ewer with Foolish Pleasure Hot Air Balloon Rides based out of Tucson. It is all blue with a crescent-moon emblazoned in the center.

Ewer could not be reached Friday.

It’s the fourth time a balloon has crashed this week and comes on the seventh day of the nine-day Balloon Fiesta.

On Monday, Balloon Fiesta officials said a balloon pilot flying alone was in a “incident” on Menaul, east of University, but no more details were given. On Wednesday, Rio Rancho police said a pilot crashed into a tree on the golf course of a shuttered country club in Rio Rancho, injuring a passenger. And the following day, according to Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office, a pilot struck power lines in the South Valley, leading to a power outage.

Friday’s crash occurred after the Special Shape Rodeo and balloon launch at sites both on and off Balloon Fiesta Park.

Bernalillo County Fire Rescue spokesman William Harris said crews responded around 8:45 a.m. Friday to reports that a balloon had struck the radio tower between Second and Fourth NW, north of Alameda.

Harris said the balloon was able to keep traveling and landed safely with no injuries reported to those on the balloon and on the ground.

He said the Federal Aviation Administration would investigate the incident.

Linda Shaw said she watched the crash unfold before calling 911.

“I watched it hit and the gondola tipped, and the people just hung in there; the balloon was hung up on the tower,” Shaw said. “When it snapped, the balloon got loose, and then it didn’t puncture it or anything, and the breeze took them south, and then the whole antenna came crashing down.”

Shaw was shaken up as she retold the story, standing beside her husband, Odell, and their black and white herding dog.

“How it didn’t tear, I don’t know, because it was hung, and how it prevented that basket from tipping,” she said. “They were so lucky. I was freaking out. I went, ‘Oh my God.’ I had 911 on, and I said, ‘Oh my God, they’re loose. They got loose. They’re still flying.’”

A little over an hour after she called the incident in, sheriff’s deputies, news cameras and yellow tape lined the perimeter of the downed radio tower.

The scene was a little like déjà vu for those in the area.

“On the 20th anniversary of Smokey Bear,” Kim Weinberger noted as she rode her horse to the front gate of Shaw Stables.

It was two decades ago that Linda Shaw watched as the Smokey Bear balloon wrapped itself around a radio tower in the same lot, where two towers stand. When the tower was struck on Oct. 10, 2004, it didn’t come down and the pilot and two passengers had to climb 60 stories down to safety, according to Journal stories.

The Shaws remember that day vividly, recalling a similar sense of fear and anxiety watching a near-disaster occur so close.

“We watched them come all the way down,” Odell Shaw said. “They were halfway down before the fire department got there.”

And as the red, white and gray rungs of the tower sat in the dirt on Friday, the Shaws said they hope it isn’t rebuilt.

“As the balloons are continuing here for Albuquerque, they (the towers) ought to come down,” Linda Shaw said. “They all come through that area. They all get close to the guy wires and everything. It’s pretty scary.”