August The Monthly Newsletter of the Willamette Aerostat Society. Volume 22, Number 8

August 2020

AeroStats

The Monthly Newsletter of the

Willamette Aerostat Society

2020 WAS Officers

President:

Shari Gale

Vice President:

Marianne LeDoux

Secretary/Treasurer:

Dale Justice

Others:

Newsletter Editor:

Shari Gale

Activities Director:

Pasha Luber

WAS website:

http://www.wasballoon.info

Table of Contents

• Riverton Rally Pages 5-6

• Rally News Page 6

• Alvord Desert Adventure

Pages 7-9

• Meet New WAS members

Page 9

• WAS application Page 10

Email:

ExecComm@wasballoon.info

WAS Zoom Meeting:

Wednesday,

August 12, 2020

at 7:00 PM

A link will be

sent to all current

WAS

members.

Check your

email!

Our Goal: Stay

in Touch!

The WAS Executive Committe has decided to keep the Zoom meetings going this summer. It is the easiest and safest way for us to get together during the pandemic.

Our next virtual meeting has been organized on Wednesday, August 12, 2020 at 7:00 PM.

All you need is a computer, pad, or phone plus the Zoom app to participate.

Cory Miller will be hosting the meeting this month. A link has been sent to all current WAS members. A reminder will go out again closer to the meeting. To get on Zoom just click on that link provided in the email.

It’s a fairly painless process. We are all looking forward to checking in with you on Wednesday!

Secretary/Treasurer’s Report

Willamette Aerostat Society

Willamette Aerostat Society General Meeting on ZOOM

Wednesday, July 8, 2020

Present:

Shari Gale, President & Newsletter Editor Marianne LeDoux, Vice President

Dale Justice, Secretary/Treasurer Pasha Luber, Activities Director

and approximately 8 additional members.

1. Meeting was called to order at 7:01 p. m. by Shari using Zoom on the internet.

2. Moved by Pasha, seconded by Tim Gale, to approve the minutes of the June 13, 2020 meeting as printed in the July, 2020 Aerostats newsletter. Seconded by Cheryl Isaacs. Motion passed.

3. Treasurer’s report — from Dale, as of July 7, 2020. 2020 Members 47 (29 memberships paid)

Checking $1,067.35 Savings 105.00

Cash 7.00

Total $1,179.35

4. Correspondence – Chris Whitfield talked to the City of Albany Parks & Rec. Dept. They want a copy of each pilot’s insurance before flying from Albany’s parks. No commercial activity is permitted.

5. Regulatory – no news.

6. Events – Most events until September have been canceled due to the pandemic. The following may or may not be held. An update will be in the newsletter. Teton Valley Balloon Rally was held with restrictions. Only pilots and crew were allowed on the field. There were no paid riders, and the spectators had

to stay in their cars in socially distanced parking spaces. 14 balloons attended.

• Spirit of Boise Balloon Classic is canceled. • Great Reno Balloon Race is canceled. • Alturas, CA Rally – Sept 18-19

• Great Prosser Balloon Rallyis canceled.

• Walla Walla Balloon Stampede – Oct., dates to be decided later, if it is held.

• AIBF – (Albuquerque) canceled

Greg Miller reported that the Riverton, WY rally is still scheduled, and he is planning to attend.

7. Old business – Dale will talk to Chuck Coussens about getting on line memberships available.

8. New business – None 9. Discussions –

Idaho Falls may have a one day fly out.

Several pilots are planning to fly out of Timber Linn park in Albany this summer.

10. Next meeting will be using Zoom on

Wednesday, August 12, at 7 p.m. More information

will be in the newsletter.

11. Shari adjourned the meeting at 7:38 p.m. Respectfully submitted,

Dale T. Justice /signed/dtj/7-16-2020

Event information in this newsletter is not to be considered as an endorsement by WAS, its officers, or its members.

Happenings

_{in the Pacific Northwest and beyond}

Wednesday, August 12, 2020 WAS General Meeting

7:00 PM

Place: the comfort of your own home via Zoom. A link will be sent to all current members of WAS. Just click on the link to get connected on the above day and time.

Canceled!

August 28-30, 2020

Northwest Art & Air Festival

Albany, OR

http://nwartandair.org

Canceled!

Spirit of Boise Balloon Classic

Boise, ID

https://spiritofboise.com

Canceled!

Great Reno Balloon Race

Reno, NV

https://renoballoon.com

September 18-19, 2020 Alturas Balloon Festival

Alturas, CA

https://alturaschamber.org/ balloonfest

Canceled!

Great Prosser Balloon Rally

Prosser, WA

Postponed until October Stay tuned for dates

Walla Walla Balloon Stampede

Walla Walla, WA

Canceled!

Albuquerque Int’l Balloon Fiesta

Albuquerque, NM

Missing your

ballooning

friends?

Join WAS!

You will be invited to

our fun monthly

Zoom meetings.

I hadn’t thought much about attending the 40th Rendezvous in Riverton, Wyoming, as it usually conflicts with the Balloons over Bend rally. This year was different as Balloons over Bend was canceled, along with everything else, because of the Covid-19 virus. So when Pat Newlin called me and told me she had a sponsored position for us, I decided it was definitely time for a new adventure.

It’s a long, very long drive to Riverton, Wyoming from Central Oregon, so Jason (my crew chief, see separate article about Jason and Jenny) and I, hopped in the Suburban with our new 105 in tow, and headed to Riverton. We left Prineville early Wednesday morning July 15 and drove to Idaho Falls, to spend the night. The next day we drove into Riverton in time for Pilot Check In.

Having never been to Riverton, or Wyoming for that matter, there were miles of beautiful country to see during our drive. On the way, we went through part of Grand Tetons National Park, and saw herds of bison and antelope in the fields as we passed. The scenery was beautiful with giant majestic mountains overlooking the endless vast green fields. We stopped many, many times to take a few pictures. This was a new experience for both Jason and me.

We arrived in time for the pilot’s briefing on Thursday evening. There were 30 pilots at the Riverton event. It was nice to see pilots we knew like Jeanne Anson, Greg and Susan Lindsey, Mike and Tamie Shrum, and a couple of long-time good friends, Peggy Watson-Meinke, and Cristel and Fred Dinkler.

We listened with interest at the pilot briefing. There seemed to be a lot of red zones, which made the area seem intimidating. We were

told not to fly east, past the river. There was only one road that leads up the mountain, and it will take at least four jeeps with crew to retrieve you and your equipment. We were also told not to fly west past the river because that is the border of the Wild River Indian Reservation. It’s not that you are not welcome on the reservation, but getting out has some touchy challenges. Face masks

were required everywhere, both inside and out. Local restaurants closed at eight, including almost all the drive-up windows. That made it hard to find dinner Thursday night.

Friday morning was media day. There were actually very few members of the media on site. We took up some friends of the festival instead. My passengers were a mother with three small kids. The sunrise was spectacular, and the skies were very blue. Due to the small launch field at the college we were in the second wave. Winds were forecast to pick up mid-morning, but all indications were for a great flight. We were almost the last one off the field during the second wave. We had an easy launch. However, about 30 minutes

Riverton Wyoming Rendezvous, July 17-19, 2020

By Greg Miller

into the flight the wind picked up a lot. We were looking for a landing site while cruising at 16 knots at tree top level. A very large vacant lot was in our flight path. With the crew’s help and a dropline, we had a stand up landing in the large lot.

Saturday the winds were still blowing, so flights were canceled. We decided to go tour the area. Jason and I decided to go to South Pass City, a gold mining ghost town, about 60 miles from Riverton. It is a very cool old ghost town up in the high elevation of Wyoming. There were about 25 business buildings and a couple residences, and the old mill itself up at the site. According to the park hostess, the town was a bustling gold town, with millions of dollars in gold taken out of the

hill. In 1898 someone decided there was no gold left, and everybody left heading to other parts. They just abandoned everything. The state of Wyoming eventually bought the property and turned it into a State Historic Site. The buildings were left as they were, including all the contents. They put plexiglass over all the doors and windows so you could view into the rooms. We spent about two hours there. We found it to be very fascinating and worth the drive.

We headed back to Riverton for the night glow pilots meeting. It was still too windy, so we did a 15-minute waste-propane-burner show. Afterwards we went to dinner with Cristel and Fred Dinkler.

Sunday morning our passengers were our sponsors. They were the owners of the Phillips 66 Pit Stop gas stations throughout the area. They are super, great people. We had a great flight with them.

The wind was very soft to the west, heading right to the Wind River Reservation. Several of the balloons went high in order to fly over the reservation. They were able to catch a box wind back across the river. We ended up landing with three other balloons in a large alfalfa field just 100 yards from the

river. The land owner was a great lady. She even helped pack up. It was a very good flight on Sunday morning. It was time to head back to the hotel, turn in our banners and say our good-byes. Then we started the return trip back to Central Oregon.

Since neither Jason or I had been to Wyoming, we decided to take the loop through Yellowstone National Park. We saw a lot of elk and eagles, but not much other wild life. Still, the scenery made up for it. We got to Old Faithful at 5 p.m., and as luck would have it, the next eruption was just an hour away. We grabbed some to-go food at the cafe and sat with about 600 other park visitors. At precisely 6:01 pm the geyser erupted. It was an awesome sight.

As we were walking away from Old Faithful we ran into Peggy Watson-Meinke and her crew, so we formed a caravan as far as Idaho Falls. The next morning after a great breakfast, Peggy headed to Nevada, and we headed to Oregon.

Jason and I had a great time, and put a total of 2,248 miles on the

chase truck. After stopping Tuesday night in Boise, we made it home on Wednesday. We had a great time, and it was fun to be able to make it to a fun rally and see old friends, and make some new ones.

Riverton Wyoming Rendezvous

continued from page 5

More Rally Cancellations Announced

announcements were issued recently. COVID-19 is certainly impacting our flying season!

Labor Day weekend has traditionally been reserved for the Spirit of Boise Balloon Classic. Balloon crews from all over the West Coast converge on Boise for the event.

The rally was considered a “go”

County and the City of Boise have become hot spots for the virus. The Central District Health Department decided on August 4th to not allow the festival to continue after all — even with a drastically pared down schedule.

It was also announced recently the Great Prosser Balloon Rally in Prosser, Washington has been canceled. They plan to air video

or three local balloons launch this year while they live stream it. The organizers also want several pilots to make short videos about ballooning history, the basic balloon system, and the flight experiences they’ve had in Prosser in years past.

Everyone is trying to come up with solutions to keep sponsors, spectators and balloonists as content as possible during these difficult

What do you do when you are itching to fly, but there’s not much opportunity here in the valley? Well, you head for wide open spaces with a few close ballooning friends. By wide open spaces they meant it literally. The location this Oregon balloon group chose was the Alvord Desert in Southeastern Oregon’s Harney County. The closest town is Fields with a population of 10 to 12 people. They do have a restaurant, fuel, tire repairs and even a small hotel.

All 14 people in the group chose to forsake the hotel in favor of RV’s, travel trailers and tents. They rented a porta-potty on wheels. Dale Justice volunteered to hitch it up to his Suburban instead of taking his balloon, in order to get it from Burns, OR to the camp site.

Camp site? It was not the kind of camp site you’d find in a state park or Forest Service park. There was no water; no electricity; nothing but barren playa (beach). Best of all, there were no other people around for miles and miles. They had the desert pretty much to themselves.

Carmen Blakely and Cheryl Isaacs brought their balloons. Others brought dirt bikes, a dune buggy, kites, bocce, dice and more than one deck of cards. They also brought enough food to feed twice as many people.

Mother Nature provided heat — lots of heat. The temperatures were over 100° F. during the day, and did not drop down until it was almost time to get up in the morning. Star gazing was a treat during the sleepless periods.

Cheryl and Michael had rented a motorhome with a generator that was guaranteed to run the air conditioning unit. It did not work! Several of the crew people were very good mechanics, but a lack of parts foiled their efforts to get it running. Dale’s Suburban upchucked a radiator plug and some coolant, but the mechanics found the plug on the ground and replaced the missing coolant with water.

Their first attempt to inflate the balloons was interrupted by gusty winds. Friday morning’s flight was

Alvord Desert Adventure

by Shari Gale and Dale Justice

scrubbed. Saturday morning Carmen did manage to get her balloon, Tierra Madre, in the air. After a short flight and three landings, she called it quits. (She had the cutest crown line crew in the state.)

These hardy pilots and crew have flown in the Alvord in the past, but this year the heat coupled with the winds discouraged everyone from staying as long as originally planned. They headed home a day early.

Still Mother Nature did not win. This great group of friends had a lot of fun while creating lasting memories. That was their true mission.

Left to right: Michael and Cheryl Isaacs, Sherry Lucia and Daphne, Mike Lucia, Jodi Portley, Carmen Blakely, Chris Lucia and Memphis, Cole and Christal, Jodi Johnson and Edie Stoaks. Photo by Dale Justice.

Alvord Desert Adventure

Photos by Dale Justice

The first look at the Alvord Desert. It is 12 miles long and 7 miles wide at an altitude of approximately 4,000 feet.

Circle the wagons! They set up their own “campground.”

As you can plainly see, Edie Stoaks enjoyed herself.

Carmen Blakely made sure she had a big tarp!

More photos can be found on Dale’s Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/dale.justice.73

Tierra Madre was happy to be out in the fresh air.

Alvord Desert Adventure

Photos by Sherry Lucia

No matter what kind of bike you were riding you had plenty of roon to roam. Memphis and Daphne used the dune buggy as a climbing

structure!

I would like to introduce you to new WAS members and crew, Jenny and Jason Ponti, from Redmond, Oregon. You might recognize them, if you attended events in Walla Walla, Pendleton, and Prosser, between the years 2000 to 2004. They lived in Walla Walla, and crewed for our friend, Jerry Cummins. Recently, Jenny accepted a job for St. Charles Care in Bend,

so they relocated to Redmond, Oregon.

A mutual friend introduced us, telling them that I was looking for more crew. It was an immediate friendship and they have become a very integral part of my crew here in Central Oregon. Jason is a student pilot and has gone through almost half of the ground school, and has about seven hours of flight time in his log book. With Cory living on the west side of the Cascades, I really need a local Crew Chief. Jason has filled that spot, and is doing an outstanding job. It is much more reassuring to have an experienced crew chief here in Central Oregon on the ground for chase.

Jenny has a new-found passion for photography, and has been able to really enjoy that passion, with her new camera. She has taken a lot of pictures during our flights, and the surrounding area during the chase. I

Please meet our newest WAS members

by Greg Miller

predict she will develop into a great photographer.

Jason was also working at St. Charles until the pandemic started, he is now doing Door Dash, and will return to St. Charles when they start hiring their employees back. Not working a regular job has allowed him to travel with me and be available to crew on weekdays, which is a great plus for me.

You will probably see them in Boise and Walla Walla, if those events happen this year. Please come up and introduce yourself when you see them. Chances are you may already know them. My biggest problem at those events is keeping Jerry from trying to steal them away.

WAS Membership Application

Please use a 2nd page if there are two pilots in the family, or if you have family members with additional information such as cell phone # and/or BFA #’s.

Name:

❏ _Pilot ❏ _Crew ❏ _{Interested in hot air ballooning}

Birthday: Month Day Address:

City: State: Zip:

Date Submitted: Home Phone #: ( ) Cell Phone #: ( )

E-Mail Address: @ BFA Membership #:

Pilot/Crew Achievement Awards

BFA Crew Level: BFA Pilot Level:

FAA Wings Level: Other:

Family Member Information

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❏ Charter ($20) ❏ Single or Family ($20) ❏ Newsletter Only ($10 outside Oregon & SW Washington)

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The Willamette Aerostat Society communicates via e-mail, the WAS Facebook page and the website. We recognize and respect our member’s privacy. If you do not wish personal information about you shared with other members, please indicate below. Your personal information will never be published on our website. It might be shared with other club members if a request is made unless you prefer to opt out.

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Waiver

AeroStats is a monthly publication

of the

Willamette Aerostat Society. WAS welcomes you to reprint

material from this newsletter by individuals or balloon club organizations

for their personal or organization use. We ask that you credit WAS,

AeroStats and the author in any reuse of newsletter material.

Commercial use of material (articles or images) for any reason is prohibited

without the express written consent

from the

Willamette Aerostat Society. Material to be considered for

publication should be mailed or e-mailed to the

Newsletter Editor at sharigaleOR@gmail.com

Publication deadline is the 2nd Saturday of each month.

AeroStats reserves the right to deny publication of submitted material

for any reason.

Material published in AeroStats does not imply endorsement

by WAS, its officers, newsletter editor, or its members

of an event.

Nor does it imply agreement with opinions, comments, or endorsement

of any product.

To obtain Member Contact information,

send an e-mail to the Secretary/Treasurer.

For Privacy reasons, AeroStats will not publish member contact information without their express permission.

Contact and Submissions

Submissions of articles and photographs are encouraged and welcome! The editorial staff re-serves the right to determine the suitability of a submission for inclusion in the newsletter.

Please email your pictures, articles, and comments to:

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Ads will be published for 3 consecutive months, or until withdrawn, for the fee shown above. The publishing of advertising in AeroStats does not imply

an endorsement of the ad or its contents. Text and images will be printed as submitted by advertisers.

Front Cover Photo:

Carmen Blakely in Tierra Madre flew over the Alvord Desert earlier this month. Photo by Sherry Lucia.

Willamette Aerostat Society Mission Statement

 To promote the sport of Hot Air Ballooning

 To educate new balloonists and the public

 To embody safety in all aspects of Ballooning

 To do all we can to support and encourage land owner relations

 To support our fellow balloonists and crews personally and in our sport