Insurance Costs and Lack of Sponsors Ends Wyoming Hot Air Balloon Fest

Organizers of an annual hot air balloon festival in Wyoming have reluctantly decided to end the event after 19 years.

Mikki Smith, organizing committee president, says the 12-member panel voted unanimously Jan. 21 to end the Wild West Balloon Fest in Cody.

Organizer Jack Way tells the Cody Enterprise that the chief problems with the August event are a lack of major sponsors and the high cost of insurance. But he says a decline in ballooning in Wyoming and the rest of the country also hurt.

Way says the festival has lost money for the past several years, and the committee decided it didn’t want to be subsidized or borrow money.