captures the moment when the smokey balloon is driven off course by a 60-mile-an-hour blast of wind. there s smokey up there. despite bill s desperate efforts, there s no way to avoid a 700-foot radio transmission tower. my first thought was to get over it. i had no option except to go up. can t steer a balloon. bill fires his burners past their safety limit, trying in vain to fight the wind, but he can t rise fast enough to clear the tower. oh, he hit the tower. he s on the tower. when we hit the tower, the balloon exploded. virtually. and it was like hearing an amplified scream of a mad woman and a mountain lion and everything you ve ever heard scream all at once. he tore a hole in him. the fierce winds quickly
how do you climb down such a long ladder? it was a long haul. i m getting a little weak in the knees, but we did it, and these kids were an inspiration. they did fine. nothing like terra firma, i tell you, the safety of the crew, the safety of the arms. we were all crying and just glad to be alive. bill presents both boys with a smokey bear pin as a tribute to their courage. meanwhile, 10-year-old aaron whitaker is shaken but in good spirits. would you ever fly again? probably when i m older. a couple years away, yeah, probably. but this year, no. sir, what about you? you betcha. you ve been flying for a long time. you bet, yep. i can t wait two years. i m getting too old to wait. thanks to a nationwide fund-raising effort, bill launches brand-new smokey balloon in 2005, less than a year after the accident. and in 2009, bill is back in
we all have a grand time doing it. it s a good excuse to be a kid again. and at the same time preventing fires. but during a 2004 flight at the albuquerque international balloon fiesta, ironically it s the friendly face of smokey bear at the center of a catastrophe. well, it was like any other day. it was the last day of the fiesta here. the weather was as predictable as it could be. they had predicted calm breezes, and that s the way it started. bill has two young passengers in his balloon, 14-year-old troy wells and 10-year-old aaron whitaker. on that particular morning, we had what you call microbursts or wind shears that just come out of nowhere. a sudden wind that just fouled everything up that morning. a spectator on the ground captures the moment when the smokey balloon is driven off course by a 60-mile-an-hour
a sudden wind that just fouled everything up that morning. a spectator on the ground captures the moment when the smokey balloon is driven off course by a 60-mile-an-hour blast of wind. there s smokey up there. despite bill s desperate efforts, there s no way to avoid a 700-foot radio transmission tower. my first thought was to get over it. i had no option except to go up. can t steer a balloon. bill fires his burners past their safety limit, trying in vain to fight the wind, but he can t rise fast enough to clear the tower. oh, he hit the tower. he s on the tower. when we hit the tower, the balloon exploded. virtually. and it was like hearing an amplified scream of a mad woman and a mountain lion and everything you ve ever heard scream all at once. he tore a hole in him.
sir, what about you? you betcha. you ve been flying for a long time. you bet, yep. i can t wait two years. i m getting too old to wait. thanks to a nationwide fund-raising effort, bill launches brand-new smokey balloon in 2005, less than a year after the accident. and in 2009, bill is back in albuquerque to help celebrate smokey bear s 65th anniversary. but no one involved will forget that fateful day in october when a pilot and his passengers were lucky to escape with their lives. you know, with ballooning, the takeoff is optional. landing is a must. and so we just had a landing we didn t expect. all of the people we ve met in this hour have been changed by their experiences in ways, large and small, and whether they were saved by others or they found a way to save themselves, they feel lucky to be alive. if you have a video you d like to send to us, logon to our website, caughtoncamera.msnbc.com. i m contessa brewer. that s all for this edition of caught on camera.