ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A hot air balloon bumped a power transmission line, causing outages that impacted around 13,000 PNM customers Monday morning in Albuquerque.

At first, the balloon bumped one of PNM’s larger power lines. Then, cell phone video shows a not so smooth landing.

“Trying to find stuff for my employees to do, you know? So we had a little light in here. So we mopped and cleaned and then went outside for a little bit, watched the balloons,” said Anthony Aguilar, branch manager of the Standard Restaurant Supply. 

Aguilar is talking about the widespread power outage that hit the metro Monday morning.

“Employees started coming in about 8, and about 8:15 that’s when I think power outages started happening. And yeah, computers are down. We had one customer come in. We wrote his information down and let him have his equipment because it is Balloon Fiesta,” said Aguilar. 

Standard Restaurant Supply on Menaul was one of dozens of businesses effected. 

At one point, the PNM outage map showed over 12,000 customers without power.

“The balloon came in contact with the transmission line. And so the transmission line essentially takes the power from wherever it’s made, wherever it’s generated, takes that to our substations, which takes that to our distribution lines,” said PNM Spokesperson Eric Chavez. 

Chavez says this all happened around 8 Monday morning near Stanford and Claremont. Power was restored around 9:30 a.m.

“We really hope for an incident free Balloon Fiesta. We hope that nothing else happens in the coming days, but we are prepared if something does,” said Chavez. 

Balloon Fiesta officials confirmed the balloon is the Master Blaster flown by Gary Odom.

Hitting the power line was just the start, Odom was able to fly the balloon about a half a mile. 

Viewer video shows the balloon hitting a streetlight and then ripping. Onlookers rushed to check on the pilot and help him secure the balloon. 

As for Aguilar, he says he and his employees just go with the balloon flow this time of year.

“We did make, had a little bet going on, saying, ‘Was it a balloon or somebody watching the balloons and ran into something?’ But we found out it was a balloon. Just want to make sure they’re OK,” said Aguilar.

A Balloon Fiesta spokesperson says Odom was flying solo and no one was hurt.

An important reminder as Balloon Fiesta continues. If you see a balloon tangled in power lines, PNM says don’t touch the line or the balloon because it could still be a live wire. The best and safest thing to do is call 911 and PNM. 

This isn’t the first time we’ve seen this during Balloon Fiesta. In 2021, the Devil balloon hit power lines with three people on-board. Neighbors, including someone who worked for PNM, stepped in to help those on-board during that incident.

During the 2004 Balloon Fiesta, Smokey Bear made national headlines after crashing into a radio tower on the last day of Fiesta. Three passengers – two boys and the pilot – dangled nearly 700 feet above ground before climbing down the tower.