Balloonomania their ballooning stunts, with Blanchard and his companion Dr. John Jeffries being the first to cross the English channel in a balloon on January 7, 1785. The public reaction among intellectuals and academics was generally cooler, with some critics of balloonomania including the likes of Sir Joseph Banks and Samuel Johnson, who wrote in a 1783 letter to Hester Thrale, who had inquired about the nature of hot air balloons, “Happy are you, Madam, that have ease and leisure to want intelligence of air balloons. Their existence is, I believe, indubitable, but I know not that they can possibly be
2012 Ljubljana Marshes hot air balloon crash 2012 Ljubljana Marshes hot air balloon crash The 2012 Ljubljana hot air balloon crash occurred on the Ljubljana Marshes in central Slovenia on 23 August 2012, killing six people while 26 others survived. A hot air balloon carrying 32 passengers, mostly tourists, crashed and caught fire during a thunderstorm on the Ljubljana Marshes, in the Municipality of Ig, between Lavrica, Črna Vas and Ig, next to Ig Street (), two hundred meters from the turn for Matena, seven kilometres south of Ljubljana. A sudden weather change caused the pilot to try to land immediately. However, the emergency landing was thwarted