howardwhite

I'm looking for a similar conversion, "A Sport is Born," the 1962 Oscar-nominated feature with aerial filming by Lew Sanborn. A friend says he has a copy somewhere and is looking for it. It's further complicated by the fact that it's in Cinemascope and requires a special anamorphic lens to project. And I haven't yet addressed the question about whether conversion houses will balk at converting copyrighted material. It won't be cheap. I paid ~$100 earlier this year to have about 40 minutes of 8mm silent film converted to DVD. Lew told me that the original freefall footage, in cannisters carefully marked "Original -- Do Not Project," was stolen from storage in Orange, MA after Parachutes Incorporated closed in 1984. Virtually everyone who took a first jump course at a PI center over a span of more than 20 years saw this movie. Anyone who taught those courses can recite large chunks of Chris Schenkel's narration from memory. "Four baton passes in 30 seconds -- a new record." "There's Lew Sanborn, making it all look so easy." HW

It's called an "Aleratec Digital Photo Copy Cruiser" and it's at B&H for $150. Good product.

Here's the full message from Ben Liston of Mass Defiance. Note his caution about booking in advance. --- Until further, Mass Defiance will be offering free coaching on Thurs. evenings from 7pm - 10pm at Skyventure NH. We can either help you organize your tunnel time before you go in, sit in the chamber and offer feedback between your flights, or actually get in air with to do drills, 2-ways, 3-ways, or 4-ways.... Your choice! So if you want to learn how to do knee turns, improve you fall rate adjustment, work on side sliding, learn how to do burble hops, or anything else, come on out! All you need to do is book your time with the tunnel directly for Thurs. evening and note with them that you'd like to have some free coaching from Mass Defiance. Pls. note, reserving flight time in advance is important, they seem to be running strait through the evenings more and more, so call ahead! See you in the tube, -Mass Defiance

Members of Mass Defiance, a nationally-competitive four-way team, are offering free coaching every Thursday from 7 p.m on at SVNH They've spread the word on local mailing lists and probably could accommodate a Redwings fan in Bruins territory. HW

pm sent

Thanks for the reference. I'd seen your site -- Google found it in a search for Ortner Field. I think the picture you refer to is actually a B-26, a very different beast. I'll keep looking for published stories. My current effort was to tie the original Lake Erie story to the plane's ultimate fate. HW

Thanks for the link;I hadn't found it. His details square up pretty well with what I gleaned from the other sources. There are lots of contemporary newspaper accounts with quotes from the survivors. That thread also refers to a fairly recent Parachutist piece which I had heard of but will now look for. HW

I have email addresses for all of them. If the email address in your profile is correct, I can forward it to them; it's then up to them if they ever want to hear from you again. Same for anyone else; I don't want to give out email addresses but will forward info to them or anyone else in the pix. Some don't have emails and I would be happy to snail-mail them. HW

I've recently gotten some pictures of the last days of the Lake Erie B-25, and took a look back at old newspaper clippings of the event. There have been stories in Parachutist and elsewhere, but I'm not sure any have followed through to the very end. The published transcript of the controller and pilots in the area is particularly eerie. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with all this stuff, but it would be interesting to hear from people with first-hand knowledge. For those unfamiliar with the story, here's my "brief" version: ---- Sixteen skydivers drowned in Lake Erie Aug. 27, 1967 after exiting a B-25 bomber at 20,000 feet over a cloud layer. Two others were rescued from the lake, and two more, who were equipped with oxygen and, who, intending to go higher, exited later on a second pass and landed at the intended DZ. The B-25 had taken off off from Ortner Airport in Wakeman, OH, about 10 miles from the lake. A Cessna 180, whose pilot intended to photograph the exits, took off from Ortner at about the same time. A month later, the National Transportation Safety Board chairman told a Senate committee in Washington that principal blame for the accident rested with the B-25 pilot and a controller at the FAA's Cleveland Center. The pilot "should have terminated the mission without releasing the jumpers," because the cloud cover prevented him from seeing he was over water. The controller was faulted for wrongly identifying the B-25 on radar, apparently mistaking the Cessna 180 for the bomber. But the NTSB said the jumpers, "all of whom were experienced and aware of the hazards of jumping under the prevailing conditions, were not without fault." In the wake of the accident, there was a serious threat of Congressional action that would sharply regulate skydiving. In December, 1967, the FAA recommended indefinite suspension of the pilot's certificate, and in October, 1972, a federal district judge ruled the FAA was responsible because the controller mistook the Cessna, which was over the Ortner Airport, for the B-25. Some time after the Lake Erie accident, the B-25, N3443G, was purchased by Yankee Air Force, Inc., a flying club based at Turners Falls, MA, The Massachusetts Sport Parachute Club had an active jump operation at Turners Falls, and the arrival of the B-25 brought expectations of a great new jump plane. It was not to be. The B-25 never received approval for use by jumpers, and sat on the ground at Turners Falls, sorely lacking attention. Eventually, a buyer was found and a ferry pilot was selected. The pilot had served in the Air Force and had logged 512 hours by the time he was discharged in 1957, according to a report by the Massachusetts Aeronautics Commission. He resumed flying in 1966, and had logged 30 hours in smaller plances between then and August, 1970. On Sunday, Aug. 9, 1970 -- just a few weeks before the third anniversary of the Lake Erie disaster, N3443G took off from Turners Falls and headed about 15 miles east to Orange Municipal Airport, apparently so the pilot could practice additional takeoffs and landings on the somewhat longer runway there -- the NTSB report describes the purpose of the flight as "practice." According to the report, the plane was on its second go-around, with gear and flaps down. The pilot added power, but the plane stalled, rolled to the left and hit the ground inverted. The NTSB listed the probable causes of the accident as the pilot's attempting an "operation beyond experience/ability level," and his failure to "obtain/maintain flying speed." It noted he had "no time in type acft for about 11 yrs." Eyewitnesses on the ground, including ground crew at the edge of the parachute landing "bowl" at the Orange Sport Parachute Center, reported seeing the plane upside down overhead before it hit the ground, essentially nose-first, just southwest of where they were standing. The pilot, the sole occupant, died in the crash. ---- The pictures are of the B-25 at Turners Falls and three of the wreckage at Orange. In the third picture, you can see people standing at the student radio facillity on the raised lip of the bowl. That's where the nearest eyewitnesses were standing. HW

Nancy may also soon be a movie star, sort of. She and Sally Hathaway did stunt double work for the forthcoming Christmas blockbuster, The Good Shepherd. It's a story of the early days of the CIA. Look for the Beech-18 scene. HW

Good for you.

It's also in the Parachute Songbook I posted here a few messages ago. HW

Already extensively flained around here a few month ago. Search for a thread whose subject is: "anyone tried invent 3 canopies in a rig?" Dunno how to make it clicky.

Yup, and I've seen five jumpers in both configurations. I should add to my eariier reference to the C180 with seven that I believe the pilot/owner had removed that pesky plywood from the back of what was once a baggage compartment. That dead space, occupied only by rudder and elvevator cables, maybe some antenna wires, and a battery, then becomes available for jumpers facing aft to stow legs. Center of gravity? What's that all about? HW

I cast the six vote (even though the dead stick part didn't happen). The pilot (also a jumper) had just gotten his commercial ticket the same week. His friends, some of whom were really small, asked him to take six. He asked me; I said I didn't so. He asked another jumper, who was also a pilot and a big FAA controller guy. He said he didn't think so. Nonetheless, it happened. The FAA dude ripped the pilot up and down, but didn't do anything else. I saw the pilot last year. He was a senior 767 captain. Five was pretty common in the 182 at that DZ in the late sixties and early seventies. [I also heard about, but never saw, seven jumpers in a Cessna 180, at a backwoods DZ in Maine. Knowing the pilot involved, I totally believe it.] HW

All, and more, in the attachment, which seems otherwise to have disappeared from some sites which used to have it. The "original" Parachute Songbook was created and published by Dan Poynter when he was working for PI in Orange, MA. The local postmaster took offense at some of the lyrics ("Francine McFilthy, the Skydiving Whore", etc.) and the return address -- an Orange PO box -- had to removed. Lots of the original songs have very local (Massachusetts) references and authors. (If you need footnotes, i can provide them.) The songbook was later expanded a lot. For a while, Aerographics sold it, but that version's long out of print. HW

Guess you haven't seen any members of sponsored teams lately; they've got more patches than NASCAR drivers. HW

The Norseman fleet went away when PI closed its doors in 1984. The Town of Orange breathed a collective sigh of relief; they were really noisy, as you may remember, and really busy. I had days when I personally J/M'd 10 loads of static lines (from 2,500 feet) and others did the same. Most of them are back in Canada, as I understand it. One (853) was the one that fell into ruin at Elsinore but -- as you can see on my site -- has been beautifully restored. Did you see the picture of the Howard DGA-15 at Elsinore. I put some students out of it when I was visiting there in, I think, 1976. I've seen the stop watch but never saw the World Meet flag. You are as much a packrat as I. HW

The November Parachutist has a brief account of the Parachutes Incorporated reunion in September. If you want to see more, look here. Even if you don't know any of the people (including four

Well, it's right next to Bethlehem, so you could go there and mail your Christmas cards.

Flickr will hold huge number of stills, but (I think) not video.

More than you ever thought you needed to know at: http://arstechnica.com/guides/tweaks/ipod-video.ars

Good question, fortunately easily answered On another forum (nothing to do wth skydiving) someone pointed out the Microsft Buys Firefox site (which I posted here earlier.) It, in turn came from snarkish.com, which describes itself as "intelligent talk for adults with their clothes on." I went to Snarkish, and there found the Whizzer site prominently displayed.The Bonfire lept to mind. Feel better now? HW

Jacques-André Istel, D-2, ran for governor of California in the big recall that brought you The Governator. He got 0 votes (seemingly not even his own). HW

Get all the info at: http://www.whizzy4you.com/ Please post reviews here