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One Friday evening a few weeks ago, Edward Ristaino launched his hot air balloon into a beautiful blue sky from a flat plain near Fitzgerald, Georgia. Aboard were five skydivers he was ferrying to a height and location for a spectacular jump.
Suddenly, on the horizon-from all accounts out of nowhere-clouds gathered into a fierce black thunderstorm. The blackness aggressively chewed up sky as it moved toward the balloon's fly area. Ristaino, sixty-three years old and a balloon pilot for some thirty years, knew instantly that it was trouble.
The only control a balloon pilot has is over its altitude. For speed and direction, he or she is at the mercy of the wind. Ristaino peered at the landscape below, saw a safe field in their path and quickly adjusted the balloon's altitude. Then he told the skydivers to jump...now!
Just after the last skydiver leaped, the balloon with Edward Ristaino was sucked up into the thunderstorm. The skydivers landed safely and said emphatically that if they had jumped just a minute later, they would have been sucked up into the thunderstorm too. They credited the quick thinking and calm demeanored Ristaino with saving their lives.
The next day, the pilot's body was found in a forest a few miles from where the skydivers set down. Ristaino had been sucked up as high as seventeen to eighteen thousand feet, the storm collapsed his balloon...and he plummeted. His last radio contact was at two thousand feet...on the way down. He said he could see the tops of trees.
About a week later, eighty-one year old pilot John Collins was flying his Cessna twin-engine plane through the puffy white clouds over Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin. Only his eighty year old wife, Helen, was aboard. Helen, though she had had a few flight training lessons, did not have a pilot's license, was unfamiliar with the Cessna and had never flown a plane on her own.
Suddenly John collapsed unconscious. Stunned, but not panicked, Helen had no choice but to take the controls herself. She radioed for help.
An experienced husband and wife team were dispatched. The husband immediately took to the sky to help guide Helen, and the wife remained on the ground giving Helen instructions via the radio. Authorities cleared the streets below in anticipation of any eventuality.
After a tense hour, Helen landed the plane at a small airport. It was a rough landing; the plane bouncing, skidding and finally coming to rest on its nose.
When rescued, Helen complained only of a sore back.
This eighty year old woman had the presence of mind and temerity to save herself and give her husband the only chance he had. I wish I could say this story had a happier ending...her husband could not be revived.
Still, I find myself marveling at the human spirit. How human beings respond in the most dire of circumstances, conditions often thrust upon them without warning, is often awe inspiring. As it was for Edward Ristaino, so it was for Helen Collins.
Trust your people. Challenge them. Give them a chance. They might surprise you. You never know what's in them...till you find out what's in them.
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