Balloon Federation of America

Wikipedia Hot Air Balloon Page

Watchmefly balloon competition page

 

Weather Information:

• • • Air Sports Net
    • Aviation Weather Center
    • FAA Flight Service
    • Pacific Northwest Environmental Forecasts and Observations (Suggest the WRF-GFS , 4 km resolution)
    • PredictWind
    • Ryan Carlton Winds (RUC Winds)
    • SkewT (coming soon)
    • SkyVector
    • Weather Underground
    • Windy

 

Balloon Festivals:

• • • Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta (Albuquerque, New Mexico)
    • Balloons Over Bend (Bend, Oregon)
    • Great Prosser Balloon Rally (Prosser, Washington)
    • Havasu Balloon Festival (Lake Havasu, Arizona)
    • Kanab Balloons & Tunes (Kanab, Utah)
    • Lovers Aloft (Lovelock, Nevada)
    • Northwest Art & Air Festival (Albany, Oregon)
    • Tigard Festival of Balloons (Tigard, Oregon)
    • Winthrop Balloon Roundup (Winthrop, Washington)

 

Training/Regulatory:

• • • FAA Aeronautical Information Manual
    • FAA Balloon Flying Handbook
    • FAA Commercial Pilot LTA Practical Test Standards
    • FAA Private Pilot LTA Practical Test Standards
    • Part 61 Certification Rules
    • Part 91 Operational Rules
    • Propane101 – Propane safety and other interesting material

 

Apps for Ballooning:

• • • AmbientWeather– Direct information for AmbientWeather branded home weather stations
    • Glympse is a great tool to use for coordination between pilots and crew. It shows the location and speed of each phone.
    • HotAir is an app that can be used to track  flights and create pretty pictures of where you went.
    • OnX Hunt is a tool that can be used to identify landowners. Note that it only tells you who the owner of record is, not who is necessarily farming the property.
    • PredictWind – Similar information to predictwind.com
    • UltraMagic Balloon FlightPack has similar features to HotAir, but also does load calculations.
    • WeatherLink – Direct information for WeatherLink branded home weather stations
    • Windy – Similar information to windy.com
    • Wunderground – Similar information to wunderground.com

Learning to Fly / Online Ground Schools:

• • • Albuquerque Aerostat Ascension Association (Quad A)
    • The Balloon Training Academy

Balloons Equipment for Sale:

• • • Aerostatz
    • Hot Air Balloon Equipment For Sale
    • Hot Air Balloon Swap Shop

Balloon Manufacturers and Equipment:

• • • Aerostar Support
    • Cameron
    • Digitool
    • FireFly
    • Flytec
    • Kubicek
    • Lindstrand
    • UltraMagic

 

Balloon Builder’s Journal:

The Balloon Builder’s Journal was a multi-part newsletter edited by Bob LeDoux in the 1990s. It contains a plethora of information focused on building experimental/homebuilt hot air balloons. Building your own balloon can be a very affordable way of getting your own balloon. Both Bob and his wife, Marianne, have been WAS members since the inception of the club and have built several experimental balloons and helped many other pilots build their own balloons, as well. The entire Balloon Builder’s Journal, as well as various supporting files can be found here.