Hot air balloon catches fire in Texas, 16 dead

A hot air balloon carrying at least 16 people caught on fire and crashed in central Texas on Saturday, and it seems there are no survivors.

“If 16 people were killed, it would be the one of the worst such disasters, possibly the worst in U.S. history,” AP says, citing a similar tragedy that occurred in February 2013, when a balloon flying over Luxor, Egypt, caught fire and plunged 1,000 feet to the ground, crashing into a sugar cane field and killing at least 19 foreign tourists.

The Texas crash happened at approximately 7:40 a.m. near Lockhart, which is about 30 miles south of Austin. According to AP, “authorities have not said where the hot air balloon was based out of or which company was flying it, though Caldwell County Sheriff Daniel C. Law told The Associated Press that it’s the kind of situation where people can walk up and buy a ticket, unlike an airplane, which would have a list of names.”

Erik Grosof of the National Transportation Safety Board told a news conference that a full investigation will begin Sunday.

A hot-air balloon that crashed in Virginia in May 2014 caught fire, resulting in the death of three people.

By: Atara Beck, World Israel News

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