Transcription
In 1986, 1.5 million balloons were released in downtown Cleveland. It was a charity fundraiser and a way to put the growing city of Cleveland on the map. But instead of being remembered as an impressive spectacle, it would go down in history as a fatal disaster.
The event was called Balloon Fest, and it was Cleveland's way of trying to rebrand. You see, at the time, they had a pretty rough reputation, which was exemplified by its well-known nickname. City leaders wanted to prove that Cleveland wasn't a mistake and that it was well on its way to becoming a world-class city.
The previous year, Disneyland had claimed the Guinness World Record for the biggest simultaneous balloon launch. And for some reason, the city leaders thought that outdoing Disneyland was the perfect way to start cleaning up Cleveland's image. Soon after, the United Way of Cleveland developed their ambitious plan to launch nearly 1 million, five hundred thousand balloons over the city.
The event required six months of planning, including the construction of a net the size of a city block. It took thousands of volunteers hours to fill the balloons, and finally, on September 27, 1986, the day of Balloon Fest arrived.
As these final preparations were underway in downtown Cleveland, a very different story was unfolding just to the east on Lake Erie. The previous night, a severe storm had rolled through the area. "They want to remind everybody in part of Ohio, we continue with that severe thunderstorm watch until 1 AM." And about an hour before the storm, two men had gone out fishing.
On the morning of the 27th, the day of Balloon Fest, the two men were reported missing by their families. Their boat was found abandoned on the lake, and authorities suspected that the men had fallen overboard because of the weather. The Coast Guard immediately began a search and rescue operation.
Meanwhile, in Cleveland's Public Square, over 100,000 people had gathered to witness the balloon launch. The organizers were pleased that last night's storm had cleared in time for the event to go forward. But as the day wore on, the weather once again took a turn for the worse. A major rainstorm was closing in, but the balloons were already filled and ready to go. Rescheduling at this point would be near impossible, so instead, they released the balloons ahead of schedule.
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"Has just been broken in Cleveland, over 1 billion 500,000 more." There was no doubt about it, the launch was spectacular. It was a tremendous moment of triumph for the city of Cleveland, but unfortunately, this moment of triumph did not last long.
The expectation was that the helium-filled balloons would float around for a while before eventually deflating and returning to Earth one by one. But that wasn't what happened. "And the wind has just shifted just enough that the balloons are now trailing fast. This is beautiful. The blues are coming back this way. They're coming back."
The cold air and oncoming rain immediately pushed the still inflated balloons, tens of thousands of them, back down towards the ground in droves. The result was mass chaos. Balloons, one and a half million of them, caused quite a stir in Cleveland yesterday. It was part of the mortally.
Wind quickly carried the balloons to Burke Lakefront Airport, and within minutes, the runways were so clogged that all flights had to be suspended. The balloons also started to descend on certain streets, and after a number of car accidents, these roads had to be closed until a bulldozer arrived to clear out the balloons.
As all this was going on, the Coast Guard was still out looking for the two missing fishermen. Ironically, that big balloon launch at Cleveland today is one of the things that's making this search so tough for the Coast Guard. Balloons had descended on Lake Erie in massive quantities. Sixty of the balloons launched landed here instead of the planned two. "It's like trying to find a needle in a haystack here. Can you imagine trying to find somebody floating out here, or even spotting a life jacket with all these balloons on the water?"
On September 29th, two days after the balloons were launched, the Coast Guard finally called off the search for the two missing fishermen, and shortly after, both men's bodies washed ashore.
Balloon Fest was featured in the 1988 edition of The Guinness Book of World Records. However, that was the only edition to include it, and shortly after, Guinness ended the category of balloon launching altogether.
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