Last Updated, 5:59 p.m. As our colleague David Kirkpatrick reports, at least 18 people were killed and three were injured when a high-altitude balloon carrying tourists burst into flames near the Egyptian monuments at Luxor on Tuesday.
According to Egyptian media accounts, the pilot had been pulling a rope to stabilize the balloon as it landed in a field of sugar cane near the southern city of Luxor. A gas hose ripped, the fire began and the pilot and some passengers jumped from the burning balloon before it soared back up into the air and burst into flames.
The Guardian obtained distressing video of the disaster recorded by a passenger in another balloon nearby.
Mohamed Youssef, the pilot of the balloon from which the video of was shot, told the British newspaper that after the fire started when the balloon was close to the ground, “the pilot jumped because the fire was on his body. Another customer near the edge of the balloon jumped.” After those two people jumped from the basket beneath the balloon, Mr. Youssef said, the balloon rose as a result of the loss of weight and the heat. “At 10 to 15 meters, another customer jumped,” he added. “Then it reached 300 feet. Four people jumped. Then the basket separated from the envelope because of the heat. Then it falls to earth.” Mr. Youssef also described the disaster in an interview with the BBC.
The Egyptian television channel Youm 7 broadcast video of the wreckage, which was also shown in images posted online by witnesses.
An Egyptian witness, Mahmoud Mohamed Salem, took photographs of the crash scene, showing remnants of the balloon and the covered remains of victims, and posted them on Twitter and Facebook.
Several other witnesses described the aftermath of the disaster to news organizations, including France 24 and The Telegraph.
An American photographer, Christopher Michel, was on a balloon trip nearby and posted a series of serene shots of the balloons above Luxor before the accident on his Web site and Twitter feed.
“I heard the explosion just prior to our landing,” Mr. Michel explained in a telephone interview with The Telegraph. He added that over the subsequent hour he and others near the scene started to realize there had been fatalities.
In responses to other photographers who disagreed with his decision to make his photographs on the balloon trip available to news organizations without charge, Mr. Michel wrote that he did not want to profit from the tragedy.
Hot air balloon accidents in Egypt have been documented before in videos and in this report in the Daily Telegraph in 2009.
The Lede: Video of Fatal Balloon Crash in Egypt Captured by Witness
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The Lede: Video of Fatal Balloon Crash in Egypt Captured by Witness
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The Lede: Video of Fatal Balloon Crash in Egypt Captured by Witness
