THE Ribble Valley's only balloonist says he is battling on despite losing 50 per cent of his income since foot and mouth disease grounded him in February.

Graham Church runs the Pendle Balloon Company and used to complete an average of 50 one-hour flights per year.

This involved taking of from Ribchester and giving up to 12 people the experience of flying high over Ribble Valley countryside.

For the past five months this has not been possible because he cannot land his balloon in fields.

He also owns a dried fruit wholesalers which contributed the other half of his income. He has been determined to try and step up this business to compensate for the loss.

Mr Church lives in Clayton-le-Dale with his wife and what he describes as 'two expensive teenagers'. He said that they have remained strong throughout the crisis.

He said: "You've not to let it get you down - we are managing to cope. It's affected us all right but we can survive. I think the disease has done a lot more harm than good.

"The ballooning took up 50 per-cent of my time. It was 50 percent of my earnings.

"We've missed the flying as well, it's a wonderful feeling when you are up there. The equipment is all in storage collecting dust, but well looked-after. "The British Association of Balloon Operators has a meeting every month with MAFF. It's just to see how it goes on and how we've been affected.

"No restrictions have been lifted. We undertook a voluntary no-flying memorandum back in February.

"We have another business, a retail food sellers, we sell dried fruit to Blackpool. It has been going for 20 years. We've had to put more and more into it."

It is estimated that 70,000 people take balloon rides each year - a hobby dependant on the goodwill of the farmers' land they use.

As an acknowledgement of this support the British Association of Balloon Operators advised its members to cancel all flights within 24 hours of the first outbreak in February.

The Association will meet with the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs - formerly MAFF - on June 21 to review the restrictions and see if there are any areas where flying can begin again.