The Trainwreck documentary series has so far covered topics like Woodstock ’99 and the Astroworld disaster, and the newest one, now streaming on Netflix, keeps its focus on a pretty juicy scandal from 2009. Trainwreck: Balloon Boy documents what happened when two parents staged the “balloon boy” hoax that captured the world’s attention.
According to the official description, courtesy of Netflix:
On October 15, 2009, a father in Fort Collins, Colorado calls 911, claiming that his home-made flying saucer has escaped from the back yard, carrying his six-year-old son inside. This stranger-than-fiction claim is backed up by footage from a news helicopter, which catches up with the balloon and is live-streaming the chase. What starts as a local emergency quickly escalates into a national one, as everyone from the National Guard, to the Sheriff, and Homeland Security, struggles to come up with a plan to safely rescue ‘Balloon Boy’.
As the balloon softly lands, people pray for a miracle reunion – but instead they discover no boy inside. What appears to be a tragedy takes a sharp turn into something else. Public sympathy quickly turns into righteous outrage, as Balloon Boy quickly becomes one of America’s most infamous, and bizarre news stories.
Trainwreck: Balloon Boy is streaming now on Netflix. For more, check out the biggest revelations from Trainwreck‘s exploration of what happened at Astroworld in 2021.
