33 balloons take flight at airport

JUNCTION CITY -- Rock bands have them. Movie stars have them. Sports celebrities have them. But they aren't the only professions that draw highly interested fans.

``We always have people who come up to us and ask us a lot of questions about what we do, ask if they can help and sometimes plead with us to go up with us,'' said Gayle Blackaby.

``Yes, believe it or not, there are hot air balloon groupies,'' added Blackaby with a laugh, shortly after fielding questions from a youngster who would ``really love to take a ride just once.''

Blackaby and her parents, Virgil and Sandy Blackaby, all from Fairborn, Ohio, chatted with their share of ``groupies'' before the start of the 1996 Anthem Blue Cross-Blue Shield Hometown Radio Hot Air Balloon Race Friday evening at Stuart Powell Field at the Danville-Boyle County Airport. It was co-sponsored by WHIR-AM, WHIR-FM and WRNZ-FM.

The Blackabys' ``Black Bee'' balloon was one of a record 33 entries from Kentucky, Indiana and Ohio in the seventh-annual event, held in conjunction with this weekend's Great American Brass Band Festival.

Before the ``hare'' balloon -- one owned by Balloon Odyssey of Louisville and operated by pilot Brian Beazley, who recruited the balloonists for the event -- lofted into the sky at 7:20 p.m. to start the race, the groupies and others in the crowd of 5,000-6,000 spectators at the airfield ate picnic suppers, listened to a friendly battle of brass bands and caught up on gossip.

But all eyes turned to the field when it was obvious the balloonists were ready to pump themselves up. A trumpet signals the horses to the starting gate at a horse race. Propane jets do the same thing at a balloon race. Starting with the Balloon Odyssey, one-by-one, the balloonists turned unassuming pieces of flaccid material laying limp on the ground into an airborne flotilla of huge upside-down Christmas ornaments floating softly above.

Spectators not only watched the spectacular display of color from lounge chairs at the airfield, they also observed the race from the beds of pickup trucks and the hatchbacks of cars along U.S. 127 all the way to the parking lot of Wal-Mart SuperCenter in south Danville.

But the people with the best view of the start of the race were those ``groupies'' and groupie wannabes.

One of those was Darlene Mullin of Danville, a Kentucky College of Business student. As she watched the balloons being inflated, she promised her excited 2-year-old son Phillip that ``one day you'll go up.''

Mullin knows what it's like going up. When she lived in her hometown of Las Vegas, she volunteered to work on balloonists' chase crews so she could be close to an event she loved ``from the first time I saw a hot air balloon.''

``Watching these balloons is a great experience, but actually being in one is something really special,'' said Mullin, whose volunteer work often was rewarded with rides.

``I used to have a fear of heights until I rode a balloon. It's so much fun. You're literally floating on air,'' she said.

Wick Caldwell of Danville also has experienced ballooning and wanted to renew the experience Friday. He put his name on a long list of people volunteering themselves for service to any balloon crew needing an extra hand.

``I developed an interest in ballooning about 10 years ago and have gone on a half dozen or so flights,'' said Caldwell, a program manager with the U.S. Census Bureau.

``I was a pilot and a parachutist when I was in the Marines, but ballooning is an altogether different flying experience,'' he said. ``Except those few times you use the burner to fire up the propane in the balloon basket, it's such a calm, peaceful flight.''

Scott Haun, a teacher at the Kentucky School for the Deaf, used to watch and occasionally help balloonists in races in Baton Rouge, La., and ever since then has wondered what it would be like to be in a balloon.

``I enjoy watching the balloons. The colors are beautiful. It looks so peaceful,'' he said, while standing close to a crew from Frankfort getting its balloon ready. ``Some day I would like to do more than help. I would like to fly in a balloon.''

So would 12-year-old Dustin Delaney and 6-year-old Riona Watson, both of Danville and both closely checking out a balloon crew.

``I'd like to at least help them get ready. I'd really like to ride with them,'' said Dustin. ``I may want to be a pilot. I'm building a model airplane at home, but I think riding in a balloon would be more fun than riding in a plane. I've been on a passenger jet. One day maybe I can ride in a balloon.''

Riona doesn't need jet or propane engines to realize her dream. ``Just give me wings. I'd like to fly like a bird,'' she said.

``But I think it would be more fun riding in a balloon. You just float. You wouldn't get tired flapping those wings.''

When it was all over about 1 1/2 hours later, the Kentucky Lottery balloon won the race. Under the leadership of pilot Charles Hurst of Louisville, the crew dropped its marker closest to the ``X'' made in a clearing on the farm of Jack Bosley in Lincoln County. The ``X'' was made by the crew of the ``hare'' balloon. The Kentucky Lottery marker was only 8 feet from the ``X.''

``We had a wonderful flight,'' said Hurst. ``Win or lose, ballooning is so much fun, such a pleasant experience.''

It's an experience, Hurst added, that started years ago when he, like Riona, Dustin, Darlene, Wick and Scott, was a ``balloon groupie.''

``It starts with a dream and, eventually one day, you're in that basket under that balloon, realizing it,'' he said.