Published October 2003

Airial’s ‘gentle giants’ soar above Snohomish

Snohomish County Business Journal/KIMBERLY HILDEN Pilots and ground crew for Airial Balloon Co. prepare their balloons for a sunset flight across the Snohomish Valley.

By Kimberly Hilden
SCBJ Assistant Editor

On one early evening in September, seven would-be hot-air balloon passengers stood together in a grassy Snohomish field, their attention focused on a giant wicker basket and the man inside, Airial Balloon Co. pilot Tom Hamilton.

Having just delivered a talk on safety procedures, Hamilton looked around at the faces before addressing his audience once more.

“Once we’re in the air, please feel free to move about the basket,” he said in his best flight attendant voice, earning chuckles from the crowd.

He and his ground crew then set to inflating a giant hot-air balloon. Within 30 minutes, the balloon was puffed out and attached to the basket, and Hamilton, standing once more within the enclosure, told his passengers what they could expect on their 90-minute sojourn, filled them in on landing techniques and asked them to keep their eyes open for any obstacles in the air.

“At no time may anyone leave the basket without my permission,” he added, again getting a laugh out of the crowd.

Then it was time to board, and within minutes, Hamilton’s balloon was climbing through the air, joining two others in the sunset sky.

It’s a sight that never gets old for Marilyn Harvey, owner of Snohomish-based Airial Balloon.

“They’re just like gentle giants. It makes the hair stand on end on your arms,” said Harvey, whose former husband, Mike Eller, started the company 22 years ago. “After all these years, I still get excited watching them. I go out and watch them every night.”

Keeping those “gentle giants” in the air means long days for Harvey, whose workday begins by 5 a.m. with a check on weather conditions and ends sometime after 10 p.m., when the last customers have said goodbye, all five of Airial’s balloons have been seen to and the kitchen staff has cleaned away remnants of the after-flight dinner celebration.

“It’s a job keeping everything up and organized,” said Harvey, whose staff grows to 20 during the busy months of summer and early fall, when the weather is especially cooperative for Airial’s early morning and evening flights across the Snohomish Valley.

Each year, Airial makes close to 250 commercial balloon flights across the valley, sharing its beauty with more than 2,000 passengers, Harvey said.

Flying between 1,000 and 3,000 feet up, the balloons offer unobstructed views of Puget Sound and the Cascades before touching down, sometimes in a parking lot, sometimes in a farmer’s field, before being picked up by one of Airial’s tracking vans.

“At least 80, maybe 90, percent of our flights land in farmers’ fields,” Harvey said, adding, “We have some very friendly farmers.”

Basic flights, which include an after-flight toast and meal, cost $165 per person for morning flights and $185 per person for evening flights, and range between 60 and 90 minutes in length.

Over the years, Harvey has added other packages as well, such as the Wedding flight for couples who are serious about making their day a “once in a lifetime” experience. There’s also the Romance Aloft flight, in which a couple can book a private flight scheduled to take off just before sunset, with an after-flight toast and a dozen long-stemmed roses.

Sometimes, a Romance Aloft flight ends in an engagement, Harvey said with a smile.

“A lot of times, we’ll have an airplane that has a banner tow, and they’ll fly around the balloon with a banner saying, ‘Will you marry me,’ with the girl’s name on there,” she said. “… I’ll bet you we’ve done 20 of those Romance Aloft flights that have ended in engagements this year.”

New for 2004: a weekend trip to Winthrop planned for the first weekend in March.

“Over there, you can fly about all day long. We’re just going to take the big balloon over and fly eight people Friday, Saturday and Sunday morning,” Harvey said, adding that Airial will help customers with their hotel arrangements.

Also in the works is an FAA-certified balloon repair station, to be located on Airial property, just across the street from Harvey Field, the airfield Harvey’s father and grandfather founded in 1944.

“We’ve wanted to do it for a long time. It’s hard to get appointments at the repair station in Kent, which is the only such station in a three-state area,” Harvey said, noting that a grounded balloon is grounded opportunity.

But this year has been full of opportunities, she said, with the weather being consistently dry and gentle.

“We’ve been flying morning and evening for days now,” Harvey said.

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