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That Blimp Rarer Than You Imagine
Horizon Airship Touring Jersey Shore One Of Just 20 In World
By Eric San Juan
 | | --Photo By Eric San Juan For 10 years, this blimp - or airship - has traveled the skies of New Jersey. |
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Did you know there are only about 10 airships operating in the United States, and a mere 20 worldwide?
Maybe that's why people notice them. When there is a blimp in the sky, people look. Just ask the folks at Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, who for 10 years have had their logo drift through New Jersey skies on one of the world's few operating airships.
It's a form of advertising that is impossible to miss.
Through October, Horizon's 132-foot, white and blue blimp will cruise throughout the Garden State, including a recent stint at the Jersey Shore, doing what it has always done. Turn eyes upward.
But the blimp isn't merely a mobile billboard 1,000 feet in the air. It helps keep the Horizon name in the public eye, yes, but it also helps make dreams come true. As part of the blimp's ongoing mission, Horizon partners with groups like the Twilight Wish Foundation, giving people the rare opportunity to do what few others can - ride in a blimp.
Recently, two New Jersey residents, Caroline Bors, Edison, and Virginia Callahan, Peapack, had just such a chance. They got to board a blimp and take to the skies.
Horizon has also worked with the American Cancer Society, Boys & Girls Clubs of New Jersey, Special Olympics New Jersey and others to help make such dreams come true.
And getting invited is the only way you're getting on board a blimp.
According to Terry Dillard, one of two pilots, part of the 13-member crew - all but the pilots are ground crew - there are no commercial flights on board the airships operated by Lightship, the company that runs the craft. It's private work and charity or nothing. Charging for flights would make them a commercial service, putting in place a slew of regulations.
It is not as if the airship could pack many passengers on, anyway. The airship itself might be 132 feet long and 44 feet high, but the gondola is only 13 feet long and five feet wide, just enough for the pilot and three passengers. Cozy quarters indeed.
When not doing contracted runs over populated areas or making flights for charity, the airship can be utilized for maybe the best known of reasons: covering televised events such as football games. In such cases, the passenger seat is pulled out to make room for camera equipment.
The ride itself is smooth, not unlike riding in a boat. The gondola gently sways back and forth, and the view is nothing less than a panorama of the world around you.
Meanwhile, on the ground below, people invariably look up, point and delight in one of the world's most unique forms of transportation.
Maybe that's why for a decade Horizon, now in its 75th year of operation in New Jersey, utilizes this rare and unique means of getting attention.
Because it works.
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