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NYC88LA188 · Fantasy Sky Promotions AX-7

16 Jul 1988 · Wellsville, NY, United States

Fantasy Sky Promotions AX-7 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route

From Wellsville, NY to an unrecorded destination

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Event

NTSB case
NYC88LA188
Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
Accident
InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
Completed
API-reported fatalities
0 · all aircraft and ground
Ground fatalities
0
OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
General aviation
WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
Visual Meteorological Cond

Fantasy Sky Promotions AX-7

Category
Balloon
RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
CGDGK
Operator
Unknown
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From Wellsville, NYTo not recorded
Aircraft age
Not recorded
Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
Part 91: General Aviation
Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
En route · cruise
First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
In flight encounter with weather
DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
Minor

Cause areas

  • Weather condition › High wind
  • Weather condition › Unfavorable wind

Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.

NTSB narrative

ABOUT 35 HOT AIR BALLOONS WERE ENTERED IN THE GREAT WELLSVILLE BALLOON RALLY. AT 0625 EDT, THE PLT (OF C-GDGK) ATTENDED A WX BRIEFING THAT WAS GIVEN TO THE PLTS BY THE BALLOONMEISTER. THE PLT SAID THE BALLOONMEISTER INDICATED THAT THERE WOULD BE SUITABLE FLYING CONDITIONS WITH LIGHT SURFACE WINDS FROM THE SOUTH, & 27 KT WINDS AT 3000 FT, WITH NO CHANGE EXPECTED UNTIL ABOUT NOON. WHEN THE BALLOON LAUNCHED AT 0640 EDT, THE WIND WAS FROM THE NORTH AT 7 TO 10 KTS. ABOUT 40 MIN LATER, THE PLT NOTICED DUST WAS BLOWING & TREES WERE BENDING IN THE WIND. HE DECIDED TO LAND AT THE EARLIEST CONVENIENT TIME. HE STATED THAT THE LANDING WAS HARDER THAN NORMAL DUE TO DIMINISHED ALTITUDE CONTROL. THE 2 PAX RCVD SERIOUS INJURIES. NINE OF THE OTHER PLTS ALSO RPRTD PROBLEMS WITH THEIR LANDINGS. THE WIND WAS RPRTD TO HAVE SHIFTED & WAS BLOWING AT 30 TO 40 KTS.

Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record NYC88LA188
Event ID
20001213X26374
Case number
NYC88LA188
Dataset
historical-pre2008
Source SHA-256
89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
  • Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
  • Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
  • The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
  • API snapshot SHA-256: 6055f80638ce059301ab88a08e9ab4f20ecefaa086868b6308d285e06775268a; retrieved 2026-09-21T16:06:50.494Z.