Lol, had that happen 7ish yrs ago when i was Cron hunting on my slinger.
4 of us hanging on the start-crawler, the balloon was getting closer, and I started spamming sweeping gunfire for no reason

About the 3rd round, the balloon disappears and we all just stood there like.....wut?

Joked about me shooting it down while we went off to do other things while someone went to track it down