
The Doomed Cleveland Balloonfest of 1986 [video] - brian-armstrong
https://www.theatlantic.com/video/index/562556/cleveland-balloonfest/?single_page=true
======
mnctvanj
The thing that strikes me is how deep the pathos about Cleveland runs as the
newscasters hype the event ("Cleveland is no longer the mistake by the lake!"
as the balloons fly). And that everyone seemed so entirely sure that dumping a
million balloons into the sky would somehow make everyone stop laughing at the
city. And then of course they all landed in the lake anyway.

~~~
taurath
The "newscasters" are Big Chuck and Little John which were a local TV comedy
duo (similar to Almost Live! in Seattle). Its probably one of the more
Cleveland things to happen in Cleveland though.

Random aside - local shows like that are pretty sorely missing now.

~~~
selimthegrim
Man, I miss those guys almost as much as Ghoulardi.

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mikestew
"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly."
[https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0742671/quotes](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0742671/quotes)

~~~
ianbertolacci
I almost forgot, fellow babies..."Booger!"

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brightball
Funny to see this on here. I believe Clemson and UGA actually started this
trend.

In 1983 Clemson announced it was going to set the record with a release of
250,000 balloons. Georgia, being competitive announced that the next week it
would release 300,000.

Both releases happened and after Georgia's attempt to steal the record,
Clemson released official numbers that were about 360,000, allowing them to
hold the balloon release record and making UGA's attempt to 1-up the release a
wasted effort. Clemson and UGA was a big football rivalry at this point with
both schools having won titles in 1981 and 1980 respectively, while being
located only 90 miles apart.

Shortly afterward, Disney decided to take the record with a launch of 1
million balloons which I believe preceded this Cleveland event.

EDIT: Yep, Disney in 1985 release 1 million.

[https://www.ocregister.com/2015/12/02/mr-anaheim-
remembering...](https://www.ocregister.com/2015/12/02/mr-anaheim-remembering-
a-high-flying-anniversary-at-disneyland/)

~~~
RavingGoat
I was at that Clemson game. It was unreal.

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PKop
Made me think of the doomed "10 cent beer night", another Cleveland event that
suffered from unintended consequences:

[https://youtu.be/CFtR38Mlscc](https://youtu.be/CFtR38Mlscc)

~~~
justin66
That one is commemorated on a t-shirt I've seen locally.

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dgritsko
Semi-related - the YouTube clip in the article was linked to on a little
subreddit called "Obscure Media",
[https://www.reddit.com/r/ObscureMedia/](https://www.reddit.com/r/ObscureMedia/)

A wide variety of stuff shows up there, some of which might be interesting to
the HN crowd.

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cf498
>"No one is quite sure where they went, but at least they are no longer posing
a threat to fish and wildlife and they are not littering the lake"

Victory for Cleveland!

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kzrdude
Nowadays, I can't look at any helium balloon release and not think it's
littering. “Pretty” and out of sight, but still littering. You're throwing
plastic into the nature and environment.

~~~
voxadam
Not to mention the waste of an important non-renewable resource.

~~~
Sargos
The helium used in balloons isn't actually useful for much of anything.

~~~
basementcat
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium#Applications](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium#Applications)

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nanis
There was no circumstance in which this could have gone "right".

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ca98am79
yes! Big Chuck and Little John:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Chuck_and_Lil%27_John](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Chuck_and_Lil%27_John)

I grew up in Akron in the 80s and loved watching them

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perpetualcrayon
Here's another fun idea gone horribly wrong courtesy of Cleveland:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohvjLTZnH48](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohvjLTZnH48)

~~~
Rjevski
Don’t have the time to watch it now, could anyone quickly summarise in text
form? Thanks!

~~~
positr0n
10 cent beer night at the ballgame. 8 innings of increasing shenanigans and
then a riot broke out in the 9th inning. The refs called a forfeit and the
Cleveland SWAT team had to be called.

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rwmj
Not sure I'd want to fly a helicopter near that.

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debt
Unrelated: I recently found out The Atlantic is owned by Laurene Powell Jobs,
widow of Steve Jobs.

[https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/07/emerson...](https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/07/emerson-
collective-atlantic-coalition/535215/)

~~~
russh
I didn't even know a person could own an entire ocean. I should get off the
internet and start working on that first billion.

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n1vz3r
After this video, I finally got the joke involving Great Ohio Desert
(artificial desert that was intended to be landmark of Ohio) from Wallace's
1987 "Broom of The System". Maybe it even inspired his idea with catapulting
trash to Canada in his "Inifinte Jest".

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bitmapbrother
I wasn't aware of this. So they launched 1.5 million balloons to set a
Guinness World Record only to have Guinness not recognize the record and have
60% of the balloons fall into the river and eventually make their way to
Canada. Crazy times back then.

~~~
HillaryBriss
if this had happened today the president would have announced a 50% tariff on
the Guiness Book of Records

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pcunite
YouTube direct link:

[https://youtu.be/n0CT8zrw6lw](https://youtu.be/n0CT8zrw6lw)

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oicu812
More information is in this article from the 25th anniversary of the
Balloonfest:

[http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2011/09/twenty-
five_years_ag...](http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2011/09/twenty-
five_years_ago_thousand.html)

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gitgud
I wonder if this contributed to the "Don't Litter" movement in American
culture. It looks like a lot of people had no concern for the aftermath or the
environment.

In hindsight it seems people didn't think about the future as much... maybe
this changed that.

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newnewpdro
This was grossly negligent on so many levels, I find it hard to believe that
was televised live with enthusiasm just 32 years ago.

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chris_wot
The weight of each uninflated plastic balloon is apparently 2.5g.

That's 3.75 tonnes of plastic they released into the environment.

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basicplus2
Should be renamed to litterfest

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HillaryBriss
> _most of the balloons ended up in Canada_

in these tense times, Prime Minister Trudeau should look back with an open
heart to the days when a great American city gave the Canadian people
thousands of free children's toys.

~~~
HillaryBriss
trying to figure out the downvotes here. was it the Cleveland thing? do people
not think Cleveland is a great city?

~~~
DoreenMichele
Jokes are mostly not welcome here. It's possible to make a humorous remark
that gets upvoted (or ignored), but the element of politics in this specific
remark doesn't help. Politics is also mostly not welcome here and political
humor is nigh impossible to do without being offensive to somebody.

