Anyone who was in the county of Gloucestershire may have noticed two hot air balloons and a biplane in the county’s blue skies on the morning of October 10th.
A specially adapted Pitts Special S25 stunt aircraft flew a few feet over the ground, in the middle of two hot air balloons, which were closely tied together with a special ribbon, which was then cut by the plane.
The Anana Pitts Special performed a ‘knife-edge’ stunt between the two hot air balloons – a manoeuvre it had never tried before, and which was extreme skilled – in order to cut the ribbon.
As the stunt was so risky, all three pilots involved in the stunt had to have a high degree of trust to ensure that the display went off without a hitch.
Following the first pass, the Anana Pitts Special pilot, Richard Goodwin, took a second go at the manoeuvre, this time at heights of between 1,000 and 2000 feet, as the hot air balloons floated freely in the sky, followed by a round of horizontal and vertical aerobatics, which were conducted around the hot air balloons.
This stunt, which was conducted at Gloucestershire Airport, was the brainchild of tech company Anana, who used it as its last stunt in what has been a season of aerial events and displays.
The company bought a balloon, created and operated by Bailey Balloons, which is responsible for many of the hot air balloon flights operating in Gloucester and Bristol year-round.
