Surprise as Telford balloon lands in Italy
When bosses of a care home in Telford held a balloon race three years ago, they thought they might get a response from a town somewhere in the UK.
But they didn't expect one of their balloons to be found in Italy.
One of the balloons, which had been released by staff at Chilcott Gardens in Madeley, was found by a walker on a mountain near Rome, 1,296 miles away from where it was set off.
The balloon race was held at the care home as part of their celebrations for Armed Forces Day in June 2011.
The balloons were released, with a prize to be given to the person whose balloon travelled the furthest.
Each balloon was attached with a little tag, asking the finder to contact the care home and let them know where it landed.
Staff at the care home and children from local schools all set off balloons, but they never had any calls saying that a tag had been found.
That was until last month, when they received an email from 31-year-old Mariano Salvatori, who lives just outside Rome, saying he had found the ticket at the top of a mountain.
Mariano's balloon had been released by Chilcott Gardens employee Barbara Maxwell, who has worked at the home for more than 13 years.
She said: "It has been such a long time, we couldn't remember exactly what date it happened.
"After it happened, we didn't really think to much of it, so it was quite a surprise when this one came back."
Barbara has now been speaking to Mariano via email and he was able to give her the coordinates of where he found the tag so she could plot the distance on a map.
Chilcott Gardens was originally run by Extra Care, but changed hands to be run by Coverage Care a few months after the balloon race, so Mariano had to search to be able to find someone who could put him in contact with Barbara and the care home.
Trina Pooler, who also works at Chilcott Gardens, said: "We never expected it to travel so far, we thought we might get something from Leicester or somewhere, but not Italy."
