A History of Balloon Flights over London

The first ascent of man to the skies was made in a hot air balloon from Paris on 21 November 1783. Such was the progress of science that just a few weeks later a superior balloon design using hydrogen gas flew from Paris for longer, further and higher. London’s long association with balloon flights began with an Italian: Vincenzo Lunardi. He was the first man to fly from London and indeed from England on 15 September 1784 in a balloon filled with hydrogen gas. He took off from the Artillery Grounds near Moorfields and flew in the company of a cat, a dog and a caged pigeon to Ware in Hertfordshire. Following his success, balloon flights became a regular occurrence over the skies of London for over 150 years until the outbreak of World War II.

The celebrated London balloonist Charles Green was born at 92 Goswell Road, on 31 January 1785. His first ascent on the 19 July 1821, was in a balloon filled with coal gas. Sponsored by the owners of Vauxhall Gardens near Vauxhall Bridge, on 7 November 1836, he set a major long distance record in their balloon "Royal Vauxhall". He flew with Robert Hollond, the MP for Hastings and Thomas Monck Mason, to Wielburg in Germany. Taking off just after midday and flying through the night, they landed at 7am after their 18 hour journey had covered a distance of 480 miles (770 km), a record which remained unbroken until 1907. By the time he retired in 1852, Green had flown in a balloon more than 500 times, many of those ascents being from parks and sites in London.


The Gordon Bennett Gas Balloon Race started in Paris in 1906 and the period before The First World War was the heyday of gas ballooning as a fashionable pursuit. Many luminaries of British aviation design and manufacture, such as Tommy Sopwith and A.V. Roe were ballooning during the pre-war years. With accompanying tales of “derring do” on flights out of London and into the countryside.

After the war, the advent of scheduled passenger aircraft flights in 1919 from Hounslow Heath Aerodrome (near the site of the current Heathrow Airport) caused a gradual decline in balloon activity. World War II dramatically changed the aerial landscape of London and in the post war period there was little demand for gas balloon flights.

By the 1960’s and the re-birth of ballooning with the affordable hot air balloon method, London’s skies were no longer welcoming to balloonists. The needs of international air travel had taken control. A balloon drifting in the way of a de Havilland Comet, a Boeing 707 or later Concorde would not have been appreciated.

During the late 1980s and early 1990s several attempts were made to organize mass balloon ascents from London sites on Sunday mornings, when air traffic into Heathrow Airport was at a minimum. But with weather conditions having to be spot on for these fragile flying machines and the wind direction correct to power the balloons in the right direction, few of these flights got underway.

Then on the morning of 24th August 1995 the first flight by a passenger balloon flight was made across central London, passing above Tower Bridge en route to a final landing at West Wickham in Kent. Piloted by Kim Hull, a modern day “Charles Green” he said “It was like a trip down memory lane, I had lived in and around London in the late 1970’s and actually flew past the hospital where a friend from those days worked as we came into land”.

These early morning balloon flights over central London continued from 1995 to 2000 but during this period London City Airport passenger volumes quadrupled. Flights were made earlier and earlier in order to avoid clashing with the operational hours of City Airport. This limited the length of the season for these balloon flights as eventually they could only be made in the hour immediately after sunrise before the airport opened and this was only possible (without flying in the dark!) from May to mid August. Eventually as trust was developed between hot air balloon flight pilots and air traffic controllers over many years, sites even closer to the centre of London were used to make these flights. Things moved up a gear when a change in Air Law around 1999 made it possible for hot air balloons to fly in parts of Heathrow’s airspace. This was previously a “prohibited” area for balloons which covers the whole of London from Buckingham Palace westwards to Bracknell.

Due to London’s constant building development, there is now just one take-off site remaining where it is possible for these flights to commence and special Air Traffic permission enables dawn flights during the summer months. Very strict weather requirements make them subject to cancelling and re-scheduling at short notice. Also the Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations and the London Olympics in 2012, mean that after 2011 they will not be possible again until 2013.

About two to three hundred passengers a year are patient and lucky enough to take these balloon flights over Central London with Adventure Balloons, providing a very exclusive and unique opportunity to re-live the experience of Signor Vincenzo Lunardi and Charles Green.

Thanks to Kim Hull, Chief Pilot - Adventure Balloons, for taking the time to produce this 'History of Balloon Flights over London.' You can follow Adventure Balloons on Twitter or browse their website for more information.

 

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