Helicopters used to force balloon down at G8 summit

[Julian Hensey]

If you can discuss on the other posting I have done on this, but I would say this is seriously dangerous to both helicopter and balloon...

(thread here) http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=279241

http://d.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/p/ap/20070608/capt.81c527d1202648bfa749057da3b59f1d.germany_g8_summit_fra8 01.jpg

HEILIGENDAMM, Germany, June 8 (Reuters) - Police helicopters forced down a Greenpeace hot air balloon on Friday as the environmental group took to the skies to try to get its message across to world leaders at a G8 summit.

Police helicopters enforcing a no-fly zone around the summit in the Baltic resort of Heiligendamm swiftly circled the balloon, creating turbulence and forcing it to land in a field some 20 km (12 miles) from the venue.

"We were hoping to fly in a petition to the G8 leaders demanding binding targets for CO2 cuts," aid Svenja Koch, a spokeswoman for the environmental activists.

"But unfortunately the police forced us down. Their helicopters caused too much turbulence and it wasn't possible to continue."

Read more: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L08400219.htm (http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L08400219.htm)

I would say this is endangering an aircraft in the eyes of the law, and what legal powers does a police helicopter have to force a balloon down?

[What Limits]

Police Helicopters have the power to intercept any aircraft, and I guess that in this case the balloon pilot took the sensible option and landed.

Just confirm that there were no injuries to anyone in this case?

Had the balloon continued into the Restricted Area, it may have been shot down.

[Pan Pan Splash]

Did the tree huggers plan to crash the balloon into the building or something??? :rolleyes:

[Whirlygig]

I think they were planning on dropping reams and reams of petitions on the heads of our illustrious leaders. Presumably, having then got rid of their ballast, they would have shot up and disappeared into the higher troposphere.

I'm not convinced that hot air balloons are particularly eco-friendly - perhaps it was powered by alternative hot air.

Cheers

Whirls

[Heli_Sticktime]

I agree, you fly into restricted airspace expect whats coming to you :ugh:

[ShyTorque]

I think it might be quite difficult to shoot down a hot air balloon; probably easier to aim for the contents of the basket. Stupid fools are lucky it didn't happen.

[soggyboxers]

I'm sure the police have more legal powers to force the balloon down, than it had any legal power to fly into a restricted area :mad: (idiots) :ugh:

I'm sure that a hot air balloon creates no CO2 emissions and the posters were made from environmentally-friendly, recycled paper which was made from trees in sustainable forests (yeah, right). :eek:

[niknak]

Greenpeace protesters in a dingey were less fortunate when they "strayed" into restricted waters.
The German River Police simply sailed around them at high speed in a much larger speedboat until the wake sank the Greenpeace Navy...

[rotornut]

The Bundespolizei also ran over them with their boat:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEmMxcyb8fU&mode=related&search=

[alouette]

just shows that these tree huggers are another breed of left-wing tyrants:E