In my spare time, I used to have a great deal of interest in flying activities at Weston- on-the-Green (both gliding and para). The first jump students from 1 PTS at Abingdon would usually do their first 2 or 3 jumps from the cage suspended underneath a "barrage balloon" from 800 feet before they got round to jumping out of a real aeroplane. The balloon organisation was based at Hullavington and when they arrived at WOTG, it was laid out on the balloon bed (on the west side of the airfield) and initially inflated with compressed air to make sure it didn't leak before they put expensive gas in it. One day I was invited to join in this procedure. It was a case of take your shoes off, have your socks checked for foreign objects and then enter through a flap in the bottom of the envelope and step inside. It was quite an experience for me.