@Blanks said in Holy shit!!!:
@Tazz said in Holy shit!!!:
It would suck to be in a sailboat and have that come up. I was in a power boat off Tarpon Springs Fl when a storm came through and we counted 4 funnels coming down as we hauled ass home.
Florida man would speed right toward them and try to get some air
It’s happened before near Key West when a big aerostat radar balloon broke loose and some fishermen tried to save it by tying the cable to their boat…
Blimp (Fat Albert) History
In January 1991, the blimp broke free of its tether while being lowered for maintenance and drifted over the Everglades before crews activated a remote-control pressure valve.
The program suffered a series of crashes between March 1993 and February 1994, when high winds claimed three aerostats, according to Citizen reports.
The Miami Herald reported in April 1989 that the blimp broke free while it was being lowered due to inclement weather only to crash into the Gulf of Mexico about a mile north of Cudjoe Key.
center-consoleBut the most dramatic Fat Albert story may well be that of the four lobster fishermen who were taken on a wild ride when they hooked a runaway blimp to their 23-foot fishing boat in August 1981, according to Miami Herald reports.
Fat Albert lifted the boat and its 175-horsepower engine into the air before dumping the fishermen in the water near the Mud Keys.
jet fireThat Fat Albert was finally shot out of the sky by Air Force F-4 Phantom fighter jets using air-to-air missiles.
Jaime Benevides Jr., the captain of that fishing boat, told the reporter he was trying to help the Air Force by towing Fat Albert back to its rightful roost. He was otherwise happy to have his boat back, as well as his Evinrude outboard, after the ordeal.
“It cranked right back up,” Benevides said.
