No free picture of N7053Z or its model is known to the site yet; spotters' pictures may be on Planespotters · JetPhotos · Airliners.net. Operator or owner? Send your own picture.
Registered aircraft · FAA record as of November 5, 2026Balloon Works FIREFLY 8
N7053Z is a Balloon Works FIREFLY 8, a balloon with no engine, built in 1998. It has 1 seat. It is registered to Star Ballooning LLC, an LLC in Bridgewater, Virginia. The registration is valid: it was issued on February 26, 2020 and expires on February 28, 2030. It holds a standard airworthiness certificate for balloon, dated December 30, 1998.
Where is it now checking the live feed…
Checking the volunteer receiver network for a recent position…
Aircraft broadcast their own position; volunteer receivers pool what they hear. Owners who have asked the FAA not to be displayed are not shown.
Flight history: where it flew in the last seven days · follow it on the live map
Aircraft
- Maker
- Balloon Works
- Model
- FIREFLY 8 · all FIREFLY 8s and related versions
- Built of
- fabric and wickerA hot-air balloon: a coated nylon envelope, stainless-steel cables, and a wicker or aluminium basket under a propane burner. This is how the Balloon Works FIREFLY 8 family is built; the FAA does not record construction for each aircraft, and the type certificate data sheet is the authority for this one.
- Serial number
- F8-427
- Type
- BalloonFAA type of aircraft code 2 (the FAA's broad category for the airframe). Every aircraft with this code · All codes
- Power
- NoneFAA type of engine code 0 (what powers it, as the FAA classes engines). Every aircraft with this code · All codes · None NONE
- Seats
- 1
- Year built
- 1998
- Transponder code
- A969FA (octal 52264772)
Registration
- Status
- Valid registrationFAA registration status code V (whether the registration certificate is in force). Every aircraft with this code · All codes
- Certificate issued
- February 26, 2020
- Expires
- February 28, 2030
- Last FAA action
- October 7, 2023
- Airworthiness
- StandardFAA airworthiness class code 1 (the kind of airworthiness certificate it flies under and what it is approved for). Every aircraft with this code · All codes · BalloonFAA certificate purpose code B (the kind of airworthiness certificate it flies under and what it is approved for). All codes · December 30, 1998
- FAA region
- EasternFAA region code 1 (the FAA regional office that handles the record). All codes
- FAA record id
- 00033896
Owner as the FAA publishes it
- Name
- Star Ballooning LLC
- Type
- LLCFAA type of owner code 7 (who holds the registration: a person, a company, a trust or a government body). Every aircraft with this code · All codes
- Address
- 7481 Cam Bell Rd
Bridgewater, VA 22812-3216
Owners can ask the FAA to withhold their name and address from public files. When they do, those fields are blank here as well. How that works.
Documents on file 0
No bills of sale, loans or other documents are indexed against this tail number.
Earlier use of this number 1
Connections how N7053Z links to the rest of the register
- Balloon Works FIREFLY 8 183 registered
- Balloon Works 565 aircraft on the register
- Built of fabric and wicker · as the model family is built; the register does not record it per aircraft
- Star Ballooning LLC 3 aircraft registered to this organisation
- Bridgewater, VA 135 aircraft registered in this town
- Bridgewater Air Park Airport · VBW
- Virginia 5,972 aircraft registered
- FAA orders naming the Balloon Works FIREFLY 8 3 airworthiness directives
- Failure reports filed on the Balloon Works FIREFLY 8 1 reports since 1995
- Approved modifications for the Balloon Works FIREFLY 8 19 supplemental type certificates
The whole map of how records connect · these connections as data: /graph/aircraft/N7053Z.json.
Records check free · 1 to understand · 4 clear
The public federal record on N7053Z, read the way a buyer, lender or insurer reads it: FAA registration, prior tail numbers keyed on the serial number, reuse of the tail number, recent registry filings, and the NTSB accident record under this and every earlier registration.
Valid registration to Star Ballooning LLC, an LLC, certificate issued February 26, 2020, expires February 28, 2030. No fractional interest recorded. [1]
Standard certificate for balloon, dated December 30, 1998, consistent with the 1998 manufacture year. [1]
No earlier tail number is recorded against serial F8-427 for this model in the deregistered file. [2]
N7053Z was previously assigned to 1 other aircraft: Piper PA-25-235 (serial 252822, cancelled October 29, 1991). Histories keyed to the tail number alone can mix aircraft up; this check keys on the serial number. [2]
No bills of sale, loans or releases have reached the registry in recent weeks. The index covers only recent filings; older liens are in the records file. [3]
No NTSB investigation records located under N7053Z. CLEAR means the query ran and returned nothing, not that nothing ever happened. [4]
These live in the FAA aircraft records file (every document ever filed against the aircraft) and, for larger aircraft, the International Registry. Part of the full report.
AD compliance against the logbooks and flight-activity reconciliation are researched layers of the full report.
- FAA Releasable Aircraft Database, master file, file of November 5, 2026. registry.faa.gov/
- FAA deregistered aircraft file (part of the same download), file of November 5, 2026. registry.faa.gov/
- FAA document index: registry documents received in recent weeks, file of November 5, 2026. registry.faa.gov/
- NTSB aviation accident database (CAROL), records through October 28, 2026. data.ntsb.gov/carol-main-public/basic-search
This automated check reads the public federal record. Nothing here is a legal opinion, an appraisal or a statement about the aircraft's condition; a CLEAR line is a statement about the searched record, not the aircraft.
Source: FAA Civil Aviation Registry, Releasable Aircraft Database, November 5, 2026. See this record on the FAA site · This record as data