Chance ride on balloon launches new dream
Neal Hibschweiler went on a hot air balloon ride, and never came down from the high he got.
His romance with balloons began eight years ago when he and his family were walking along the Three Crowns Golf Course during the Casper Balloon Roundup, held every year since, in Casper.
A member of a balloon team struck up a conversation with the Hibschweiler family and told them that the team needed a “chaser.”
It was the first he had heard of such a task, but Hibschweiler learned that a chaser’s role is to follow the balloon’s travel and be there when it lands to help keep it on the ground and then to help fold up the huge, billowing and sometimes unpredictable thing.
That year Hibschweiler helped chase the 2005 Remax balloon. And he’s never turned back, though, as a child, he never dreamed of flying in a balloon. Today, Hibschweiler has earned a balloon pilot’s license and is a coordinator for the annual Balloon Roundup.
Flying isn’t his only passion, though. Hibschweiler also enjoys fly fishing and his job at Casper College as an electrician.
For Hibschweiler, having a balloon is fun, but it’s also an expensive hobby. To buy a brand new balloon in 2000 cost about $40,000. In 2013, the cost is now between $45,000 and $60,000. Then there’s the careful maintenance required to keep it functioning. It also requires a yearly inspection by the Federal Aviation Administration, which costs from $300 to $400. And balloon insurance is another expense.
To legally fly a balloon, one has to go to aviation school. This school is different than what airplane pilots would go through, though. Ground school, summed up as “home study,” is a major part of the training. For Hibschweiler, the hardest thing about this part of the training was understanding what the book was trying to explain. After time and time again trying to get what the diagrams were explaining, Hibschweiler sat down with fellow balloon and fixed wing pilot, Dan Grace. With the help of Grace, Hibschweiler came to understand what the book was explaining. After completing ground school, a pilot can start flying.
When flying a balloon, steering works by going up and down in the air depending on the wind direction. The balloon, or “envelope,” weighs roughly 250 pounds. The basket weighs about 750 pounds. The ideal person to fly in a balloon is a small, light to medium weight person.
Pilot Michael Gianetti, also the pilot coordinator for the balloon festival in Casper, said he flies 100-110 times a year. He tries to go out every day. Gianetti was the man who taught Hibschweiler how to fly in the air.
Hibschweiler and Gianetti both fly year-round. Hibschweiler said he likes flying in the winter best because the breeze is usually perfect, less changeable than in the summer. He loves to fly because it’s fun. The other six or so pilots around Hibschweiler when asked agreed that the fun aspect is their reasoning as well. Hibschweiler’s favorite quote, by actor Leonardo DiCaprio, goes like this, “Once you’ve tasted flight, you’ll forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you’ve been, and there you’ll always long to return.”
via Casper Journal