2012 Safety Seminar's Announced!

The Sioux Falls Balloon Club have announced they will be holding a Safety Seminar on March 10, 2012 at 7:30AM at the South Dakota Achieve.  If interested contact John Parezo.

The BFA has also announced they will have their annual ON-LINE Seminar again this year on February 4, 2012. Contact the BFA for more information.

Get the word out! I will gladly post a meeting place, date, time and contact information. You take it from there. If you fly in a specific area, let people contact you before they fly in your area. Get land owner information and terrain. Did you know my area has a testing ground for explosives; land mines and such? Good to know!! If the weather doesn't work for a flight, you'll have good company for breakfast.

Background:
Many of you have been following the very expensive lawsuit in California between numerous individuals and local balloon companies, and JCM Farming Inc (JCM).  JCM operates an 80 acre olive farm; the details of the property are readily available on the internet. To date, they have named 20 individuals or companies in this particular suit.  Several balloon operators have opted to treat the area as a PZ and signed a settlement agreement rather than incurring the extraordinary expenses involved in legal defense.  JCM has also subpoenaed sponsors, landowners, and customers.  In a separate, but relevant, lawsuit JCM Farming is also suing the FAA, USDA, State of California Food and Agricultural Department, and an aviation company.  The owners of JCM Farming are very familiar with the U.S. and California legal systems having filed or defended dozens of cases over the past decade.

The BFA board has been working on/discussing this issue since it first became public.  Only through extensive research and discussion were we able make a board decision on the BFA's position regarding the lawsuit.

Current Status:
This is a difficult and serious lawsuit, and the few balloon operators who have not settled have incurred major expenses, in some cases well into six figures.  JCM is well funded and seems prepared for a protracted/long court battle.   This is a classic "Land Owner Relations" case, yet it is far more complex than usual because of the way the plaintiff has structured the complaint.  They have complained about invasion of privacy, noise nuisance, altitude infringements, and have even implied that balloons are so accident prone that they pose a real and imminent threat to land-owner safety.  Managing this case is further complicated by the Plaintiff's apparent willingness to name anyone and everyone that could possibly be connected to any balloon operating in the area.

BFA's Involvement:
Normally the BFA's involvement in legal matters is restricted to legislative issues.  That is to say, one of the functions the BFA has taken on in the past is to represent the interests of balloonists (collectively) with legislative bodies such as the FAA.  However, even though the BFA does not normally get involved with individual lawsuits, given the nature of this case and the concern that it could have far-reaching effects, we felt it important to take a close look at this case.  The BFA Board has researched this suit at length to determine if any action would be warranted, beneficial, or even legally defensible under the BFA's charter.  We have gathered facts, interviewed balloon companies, spoken with legal counsel, talked with other aviation bodies such as AOPA, and consulted other aviation experts.  We have come to the conclusion that, under the circumstances of this case, any direct BFA involvement in this lawsuit would add little value to the cause and would incur very significant financial risk to the organization as a whole, possibly jeopardizing the future existence of the BFA. Unlike other aviation organizations such as AOPA, the BFA is primarily a sporting organization, and while its mission is to further the sport of ballooning - which can include representing the collective interests of our members as a whole - representing individual members in a civil lawsuit is outside the scope of our charter.  Unlike some aviation organizations the BFA does not have its own legal department, and lacks the hundreds of thousands of members to make such a department financially viable.

How Can The Ballooning Community Help?
The remaining balloonists named in the case have taken a stand, not only for their own rights to fly that specific area in accordance with aviation regulations, but they have also taken a stand on behalf of balloonists who may encounter similar situations in the future.  This is an expensive legal battle, and any support you may wish to give to defray those legal costs will be important in seeing this case to its end.

Contact Information:
I would encourage anyone wanting to discuss this issue in greater detail to contact any BFA board member.  All of the contact information can be found at http://www.bfa.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=51&Itemid=88889139.  If you care to contact me directly, my cell number is 505-350-2705.  Feel free to call me anytime.

Regards,
Troy Bradley
BFA President and Life Member

May 2, 2009 marked the twentieth annual Induction Ceremony to the Minnesota Aviation Hall of Fame. There were seven inductees; one of those was Don Piccard, representing the Piccard family as being inducted into the Hall of Fame.

Don had the audience right from the start, as he said that he had been decribed as being someone who would take a cat to the Westminster Dog Show. I've heard many of Don's presentations and he asked the audience, as he almost always does, if there was anyone else in the room who had shared a handshake with Orville Wright. No others present (over 400) had! He also noted that two of the seven being inducted were deceased and congratulated the Hall OF Fame for selecting him while he was still alive!

The citation for Don in the brochure at each seating location read as follows:

Donald Piccard 1926-

"Donald Piccard represents three generations of Piccards whose lives have centered on research and sport ballooning. In 1947 Piccard made his first solo balloon flight and became the first FAA certified free balloon pilot. He started the Balloon Club of America in 1948, and made headlines across the country as a pioneer.He flew the first plastic Pleiades balloon in 1957, worked for the G.T. Schjeldahl Company, where he made the first superpressure balloon, then joined Raven Industries, where he helped develop hot air balloons. Piccard, starting with the St. Paul Winter Carnival's Hot Air Balloon Race, created the modern sport of hot air ballooning. In later years, Piccard's own companies built a very popular and successful line of gas and hot air balloons.

His pioneering balloon family includes his uncle Auguste Piccard, first man in the stratosphere, his father, Jean, who invented the multi-balloon and the plastic balloon, his mother, Jeanette who flew the first FAA class "Space Craft" (the Century of Progress Balloon) into the stratosphere, his wife, Wilma, a championship and record-holding balloon pilot and his cousin bertrand Piccard, who was the first to circumnavigate the Earth in a balloon."

It was a privilege to share the table with Don and Willie on a special night!

Ed Chapman