Here’s the story in a nutshell. Six-year-old Falcon Heene, or Balloon Boy (as he is being referred to on the interwebs), was thought to have placed himself in a family-constructed helium balloon and let himself loose to roam the dangerous skies of eastern Colorado. Network and cable TV news programs reported on the bizarre footage and quickly garnered a large audience that was captivated by such outlandishness and the hopeful safety of the young child inside. As the balloon flew at fast speeds and nearly missed hitting objects along its path to nowhere, Americans around the nation watched in awe. Eventually the balloon was tracked down and stopped. Frantic citizens, policeman, and an ambulance were on the scene hoping to find Falcon safe inside the balloon. And here’s the best part–Balloon Boy was NEVER in the balloon! The whole time this event was going on Little Falcon was hiding in a box in the attic at his house. Apparently his father had yelled at him for some reason or another, so Falcon decided to release his father’s helium balloon into the sky and hide himself in the attic.
In sum, this kid DUPED us all! He had the entire nation (there were international reports, too) believe that he was in the balloon hovering the skies. Besides TV coverage, social networking sites raged with furor over this event. Facebook users created fan pages for Balloon Boy and the term “Balloon Boy” quickly became a trending topic on Twitter and sat there for a good part of the day. Also, it’s been predicted that Balloon Boy will become a popular Halloween costume this season!
Balloon Boy, kudos to you for pulling off a spectacular stunt on the country. Now it’s time for you to get severely grounded.
UPDATE: In an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, Falcon is asked why he did not come out of hiding when he heard his parents screaming after him. Falcon admits “You guys [his parents] said that we did this for a show.” When asked for an explanation of this, his father backtracks and does not answer. Hm…this whole mess could be a construed mastermind plan that started with the parents looking for what…media coverage on the family? Look after the break for a snippet of this revealing interview. [Skip to 0:40 for Falcon’s response followed by a faint fart, as pointed out by Gizmodo.]
UPDATE 2: The entire Balloon Boy incident was a HOAX! Why am I not surprised?