Amazing flight of Oscar's balloon

TEN-year-old Oscar Gravil had high hopes when he released a balloon from his garden with his contact details attached.

But what he didn’t expect was his mum being contacted a day later – from Germany.

The balloon had travelled around 600 miles over the North Sea and beyond to land in a vineyard at Nieder-Olm near Frankfurt.

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Oscar got the balloon during a visit to McDonald’s with his mum Joanne and siblings Ellis (seven) and Annabel (six).

When he got back to his Saxton Drive home in Moorgate he attached his contact details to the balloon and released it.

But it must have been a windier day than expected because 23 hours later Joanne was texted by Wilfried Berauer saying he had found the balloon while walking his dog, Angelina.

Since then he has been in email contact to tell Oscar about himself and has sent photographs.

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Oscar has been so excited by what has happened that he stood up in front of pupils at Sitwell Junior School to tell them all about it during assembly.

Joanne told the Advertiser: “It was quite exciting for Oscar.

“We let it go at about 11.30am  then I got a text message the next day at 10.20am.”

Joanne said that Mr Berauer has sent Oscar a number of emails telling him about his family and the area where he lives.

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Joanne said: “Oscar was amazed, as we all were, that it had travelled so far.

“I remember that it was a windy day.”

Oscar said: “I was very exited when I found out that somebody in Germany found my balloon.

“I never thought it would go that far as my next door neighbour sent a balloon and it only went to Leicester so I thought mine would end up in Cleethorpes or somewhere nearby.

“Wilfried sent me a voicemail that it flew 780km and landed in his town which is called Nieder-Olm.

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“I enjoyed telling my whole school about it. I was a bit nervous though.”

Mr Berauer (50), who lives in Nieder-Olm with his wife and two children and works as an analyst for the German film industry, told the Advertiser: “As every weekday morning I went out with my dog and a friend and his dog in the vineyards. I think it was January 23.

“I saw something yellow inbetween the vineyards and, curious as I am, I picked up Oscar’s balloon with a small handwritten note attached to it.

“Back home I was looking where Rotherham is situated and was pretty astonished that the balloon had travelled around 770km. Later on we found out that the balloon travelled about 22 hours, which makes around 35km per hour.

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“So I decided that it would be nice for Oscar to hear about the long journey and contacted his mum via the phone number on the note. So Oscar and I told each other a bit about our towns, families, dogs, and we had this nice little international cultural interchange project.

“My motivation was just that my own son – he’s 16 now – would have had a lot of fun and would have been very proud if this had happened to him at that age. I also remember some of my own message in a bottle projects in my childhood – they never came back. 

“Kids need positive adventures.”

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