Egyptian authorities on Monday suspended hot air balloon flights over the pharaonic sites of Luxor, one of the most touristic cities in the south of the country, after an accident that left “only two minor injuries.”
“While a group of hot air balloons was in flight, one of them collided with another at a height of 60 meters with a wind blowing at almost 13 kilometers per hour,” explains the Civil Aviation Authority.
One of the two hot air balloons fell to the ground, “of the 28 passengers, two were slightly injured and were taken to hospital for examination,” continues the Authority.
A team of investigators has been dispatched to the scene and no hot air balloon is allowed to take off before reporting their findings, it adds.
Background in 2013 in 2018
In 2013, also in Luxor, 19 tourists died in a hot air balloon explosion, then in 2018, one tourist died in another balloon accident.
Egypt, caught between inflation and devaluation, relies heavily on its tourism, which is only just beginning to recover from ten years of political turmoil, since the “revolution” that toppled autocrat Hosni Mubarak in 2011 and the Covid-19 pandemic. .
This year’s summer season has already been mourned by the death of two tourists, an Austrian and a Romanian, killed by a shark near Hurghada, in the Red Sea, which hosts 65% of the tourists who visit the country. .
Source: BFM TV
