
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, September 14, 1995                   TAG: 9509140090
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

BELARUS DOWNS BALLOON

In an incident recalling the most violent excesses of the cold war, Belarus combat aircraft have shot down a sport balloon that flew over the border from Poland while competing in a race. The two American crewmen were killed when Belarussian fire ignited their hydrogen-filled balloon, which blew up.

Two other American-crewed balloons competing in the annual Gordon Bennett Balloon Race also flew into Belarus and were forced to land. The four passengers apparently were taken prisoner.

All the balloons were forced down Tuesday, but the State Department said the Belarus government waited 24 hours before notifying the United States.

A statement by the Belarus government said the downed American balloon, which was filled with 35,000 cubic feet of highly flammable hydrogen, had approached a Belarus air base and a nearby missile launching site and failed to respond to radio calls or warning shots. An official from the U.S. embassy in Minsk went to the site near the village of Beryoza to investigate and recover the bodies.

The State Department requested that the names of the dead be withheld until their families were notified. Ruth Ludwig of the Balloon Federation of America identified the other four Americans as J. Michael Wallace, Kevin Brielmann, David Levin and Mark Sullivan.

Ludwig said Belarus military officers had not permitted ground crews from the balloon teams to rescue their downed colleagues, who were being detained. According to reports, an Austrian balloon and a German balloon, each with two crew members, were also forced down and their crews were detained.

Erin Porter, who coordinates the exchange of ballooning information among championship teams around the world, said the incident was devastating.

``No one in the balloon community can understand how anyone would do such a thing to peaceful balloonists who must fly where the wind takes them,'' he said.

Nicholas Burns, a State Department spokesman, called the shooting outrageous.

``Whatever the circumstances may have been, and whether or not the balloon was able to answer radio calls from the Belarus military, the shooting was absolutely indefensible,'' he said. ``Moreover, the Belarus government took 24 hours even to notify us of the incident. We are strongly protesting and demanding a full investigation by the Belarus government.''

The race began Saturday when 17 balloons lifted away from Wil, Switzerland.

Balloon race teams in Europe speculated that the two balloonists who were killed lost the use of their radio and transponder when their battery died during a flight of three days, much longer than planned.

``Belarus officials have expressed regret over this tragedy,'' Burns said. ``They have promised an official government commission will investigate.''

Keywords:
FATALITY

by CNB