13th Ballon Meeting
and
4th Model Balloon Meeting at Landshut

The Landshut Balloon Meeting in 2003 was dominated by rain, but this year, we were a lot luckier: The weather had improved just in time, so that the first highlight, the night glow on Friday evening, could take place as scheduled. Thousands of spectators stood and watched at the fields of the airport Landhut-Ellermühle, where the show took place.

On Saturday morning, the "big" balloons took off for their first competition flight, and the model balloons could also fly two tasks.

The 25 balloon teams had a wonderful sight from a cloudless sky this morning.

On Saturday afternoon, all the balloonists had to solve the crew tasks, which are a long tradition at the Landshut Balloon Meeting. However, the different tasks change from year to year. In 2004, we had to solve a riddle, change clothes inside a balloon envelope (aganist the time!) and disentangle knotted balloon ropes.

As the weather was still wonderful on Saturday evening, we could fly another two tasks with the model balloons.

A big thank you goes to the model balloon measuring team, to Herbert Hangöbl and Hannes Stadler for some of the photos and to my nice one-person-crew I had that evening ;-)

On Sunday morning, some of the model balloonists showed certain signs of tiredness, and so we decided not to fly any more competition tasks, but to take the free places in the "big" balloons :-)

At the prize giving afterwards, we had to catch up on a thing that should have been done a long time ago: Jessica Schwarz, a pilot of the balloon club of Landshut, had never been introduced properly, as she was afraid of fire and champagne after her first balloon flight at the tender age of seven.

Almost seventeen years later, this task was now fulfilled: With a magnum bottle of champagne over her head and an eleven-line aristocracy name, Jessi now officially belongs to the noblesse of ballooning ;-)

The ranking of the 4th Model Balloon Meeting at Landshut: