Larry Walters, the Original Balloonboy

----- Begin NetScrap(TM) -----

Larry Walters, the Original Balloonboy


Here's the winner: Larry Walters is among the relatively few who have
actually turned their dreams into reality. His story is true, as hard
as you may find it to believe . . .

Larry was a truck driver, but his lifelong dream was to fly. When he
graduated from high school, he joined the Air Force in hopes of
becoming a pilot. Unfortunately, poor eyesight disqualified him. So
when he finally left the service, he had to satisfy himself with
watching others fly the fighter jets that crisscrossed the skies over
his backyard. As he sat there in his lawn chair, he dreamed about the
magic of flying.

Then one day, Larry had an idea. He went down to the local Army-Navy
surplus store and bought forty-five weather balloons, and several
tanks of helium. These were not your brightly colored party balloons,
these were heavy-duty spheres measuring more than four feet across
when fully inflated. Back in his yard, Larry used straps to attach the
balloons to his lawn chair, the kind you might have in your back yard.
He anchored the chair to the bumper of his jeep, and inflated the
balloons with helium. Then he packed a few sandwiches and drinks, and
a loaded BB gun, figuring he could pop a few balloons when it was time
to return to earth. His preparations complete, Larry sat in his chair
and cut the anchoring cord. His plan was to lazily float into the sky,
and eventually back to terra firma. But things didn't quite work out
that way.

When Larry cut the cord, he didn't float lazily up; he shot up as if
fired from a cannon! Nor did he go up a couple hundred feet. He climbed
and climbed until he finally leveled off at eleven thousand feet! At
that height, he could hardly risk deflating any of the balloons, lest
he unbalance the load and really experience flying. [ed.-why he thought
this wouldn't make any difference at a few hundred feet, is beyond me]
So he stayed up there, sailing around for fourteen hours, totally at a
loss about how to get down.

Eventually, Larry drifted into the approach corridor for Los Angeles
International Airport. A Pan Am pilot radioed the tower about passing
a guy in a lawn chair at eleven thousand feet, with a gun in his lap.
[now there's a conversation I would have given anything to have
heard!] LAX is right on the ocean, and you may know that at nightfall,
the winds on the coast begin to change. So, as dusk fell, Larry began
drifting out to sea. At that point, the Navy dispatched a helicopter
to rescue him, but the rescue team had a hard time getting to him
because the draft from their propeller kept pushing his home-made
contraption farther and farther away.

Eventually, they were able to hover above him and drop a rescue line,
with which they gradually hauled him back to safety. As soon as Larry
hit the ground, he was arrested. But as he was led away in handcuffs,
a television reported called out, "Sir, why'd you do it?" Larry
stopped, eyed the man, then replied nonchalantly, "A man can't just
sit around!"


----- End NetScrap(TM) -----