Throughout the hot air ballooning season, we receive comments, suggestions and messages of thanks from customers who have flown or are waiting to fly with us at Virgin Balloon Flights. Reviews are much appreciated as the good ones let us know we're going in the right direction and, occasionally, the not so good ones help us to improve.
Generally, the feedback we get is very good like this message from Kyle Barrett and Narelle Summers after their recent flight over York:
'Thank you so much for our wonderful morning from start to finish. Thank you to Martin our pilot and crew. We managed to capture some wonderful pictures we thought we would share with you.'
Understandably some passengers experience frustration with the 'great' British weather which comes through in some customer reviews. Ballooning is a very weather dependent activity and sometimes flights have to be cancelled because of this or other factors outside of our control. Some of these conditions may be high wind speeds, poor visibility, unusually wet ground conditions, low clouds, rain or snow. We know that having flights cancelled can be frustrating, particularly as sometimes conditions can look and feel fine on the ground but can be unsuitable at height, or the conditions are forecast to deteriorate.
Our highly-experienced pilots base their decisions on the latest forecasts from the MET office and local airports and they will always proceed with a flight if it is safe and possible to do so. Occasionally the weather forecasts we are given prove to be incorrect. This may mean that either we have to cancel a flight at the launch site or a flight is cancelled when conditions would potentially have been flyable. Obviously, weather forecasting is not an exact science, but it is this careful consideration of conditions which makes ballooning such a safe activity. Many people fly on their first attempt but for others, it can take a few tries. It really is down to luck and each year is different. So hot air ballooning can take a bit of patience, but the more bookings you make the quicker you'll get airborne and we can assure you it will be worth the wait. It is also important to point out that the expiry date on vouchers is a 'book by' date, not a 'fly by' date and we will look to extend balloon flight vouchers if people experience cancellations near their expiry date. So keep your reviews coming in and, if you have any questions, please get in touch.