Skip to content

Man dies in Ombersley hot air balloon accident

BBC Picture from the sceneBBC
Emergency services were called to Holt Fleet Road in Ombersley, about seven miles north of Worcester

A man has died after a hot air balloon "fell to the ground", police said.

Emergency services were called to Holt Fleet Road in Ombersley, Worcestershire at 06:20 BST.

West Mercia Police said it had received a call that a hot air balloon had deflated and fallen to the ground in a field near the village.

It said a man in his 20s was pronounced dead by paramedics and the Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB) would carry out an investigation.

Allow Twitter content?

This article contains content provided by Twitter. We ask for your permission before anything is loaded, as they may be using cookies and other technologies. You may want to read  and  before accepting. To view this content choose ‘accept and continue’.

The force said his family is being support by specialist family liaison officers and no-one else was injured in the incident.

An AAIB spokesperson said: "We have a team on site and are beginning our investigation."

Map
An investigation has been launched by the AAIB

A hot air balloon festival had been taking place seven miles (11km) away from the scene, in Worcester, on Friday and Saturday.

The organisers said they "aren't able to pass comment at this time".

The British Balloon and Airship Club said it was aware of the incident and would be supporting the AAIB with its investigation.

"Our thoughts are with the family and friends of those involved at this time," it added.

One local resident, who wished to remain anonymous, said they were in their garden, which looks out towards Ombersley, at around 06:00 when they saw two hot air balloons in the sky.

"One seemed to be alright, but as the other one was going I could see something wasn't right with it - it was semi-deflated," they said.

"Though it was quite a way from me, you can usually see flames, we get quite a lot of balloons over here… then it just started to sort of fold up and then it, literally I blinked, and it had disappeared."

A little while later, they said, they heard a number of sirens.

Presentational grey line

Follow BBC West Midlands on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Send your story ideas to: [email protected]