Zing

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Everything posted by Zing

  1. Seems like it was the helicopter that got tranked by the moose. Zing Lurks
  2. I've been bitten on the ass by a couple of parachute harnesses. Zing Lurks
  3. We called em' mucklucks when I grew up in the frozen North. They're strictly indoors wear. These are actually Acorn shoes. Same thing the astronauts wear on the Space Shuttle. All I know is that the floors are cold in my house during the winter and these things keep my toes toasty warm. Zing Lurks
  4. Mucklucks work good, too. I like my feet warm and cozy in the winter. Zing Lurks
  5. Eleven years ago I bought a new pickup truck. Driving back home after having a campershell mounted on it, I had a few dollars left over and saw a sign at a major oil change shop that said, Lifetime oil and filter change $59.00. The vehicle now has almost 200,000, and has had its oil and filter change religiously every 3000 to 3500 miles. When they chnage the oil, they also air up the tires, fill up the windshield wiper fluid, wash all the windows and check out all the belts, hoses and fluid levels, etc. while its up on the rack. A few years ago they added a $1 fee for oil recycling. I figure I've spent less than $100 on oil and filters for this truck since I've owned it. I just giggle every time I stop in the shop. Zing Lurks
  6. That's good to hear. Hope he's doing well. Zing Lurks
  7. The lack of info as to what is causing the damage to the cables is a bit odd. Zing Lurks
  8. Ahhh ... the good ole days! Zing Lurks
  9. And I always thought Rocket J. Squrrel was the one that flew on the Rocky & Bullwinkle Show. Zing Lurks
  10. Zing

    Five years ago

    I was getting a Porter out of the hanger at Elroy that morning and stopped to watch for the shuttle pass over Arizona. I saw the fireball and the breakup and wondered what that was all about. It didn't look the way previous shuttles had, but I didn't know what I'd just seen until hours later when I shut down the airplane. Walking toward the hangar, I heard one of the Airspeed team tell another one that no one had survived ... then I knew. Zing Lurks
  11. Then you just holler out a generic, "Hey everybody, watch this!" Zing Lurks
  12. Why, its almost, well kinda, sorta ... well, you know ... almost just like it is in the real world. Zing Lurks
  13. And folks wonder why some people refuse to believe in the theory of evolution! Zing Lurks
  14. Zing

    Salvia Divinorum

    They don't call it loco weed for no reason. Zing Lurks
  15. It missed Mars by about 3.5 planetary widths. Close, but close only counts in horseshoes and nuclear weapons explosions. Zing Lurks
  16. My first flight instructor told me that a good landing is one that the airplane can be flown again afterwords, but any landing you can RUN away from is good enough. He was real big on staying alive. Some of the stuff he taught me served me well on a few white knuckle flights. I'm still alive, anyway. Zing Lurks
  17. For an interesting take on blue-eyed people, look for the legend of the blue-eyed gunfighters. It claims that the majority of the successful gunfighters (those that survived longest) from the Old West tended to have blue eyes. It puts forth the premise that blue-eyed folk, in a high tension situation tended to decide to act and followed through immediately, whereas dark-eyed folk tended to hesitate and consider other options ... just long enough for the blue-eyed gunfighter to shoot first. I believe there is a page or two devoted to this legend in the old Time/Life series of books on the Old West. It was in the volume titled "The Gunfighters." Zing Lurks
  18. Hi Jerry, I never heard the whole story of Lowe's involvement with Elevator's Caribou, but if memory serves, the one that came to Coolidge was the second Caribou Elevator worked on. I do believe it came to Arizona not long after Jim Lowe died. I agree with you. Elevator is, indeed a damn good pilot. I haven't seen him for many years, but I heard a rumor a couple years ago he was in poor health. Zing Lurks
  19. This Caribou, N700NC, belonged to Jim O'Meara and was at Elsinore for a while in 1994. I got a little stick time in this one, too, but unlike Elevator, O'Meara was not a competent pilot and scared the hell out of jumpers several times. The last load it flew at Elsinore, the left engine threw a rod on the way to altitude. O'Meara elected not to shut it down and was barely able to maintain enough altitude to get back over the dropzone for exit. In fact, a few jumpers elected not to jump because of the low altitude. I wasn't on that load because I'd already told O'Meara I wouldn't copilot with him and would not get in any airplane he was flying. The airplane ended up going up to Alaska. I later heard that the plane crashed after the elevator control system failed and the pilots lost control of the airplane in flight. I don't know if O'Meara still owned the airplane when that happened. I do know that shortly before O'Meara left SoCal, the DEA was looking for him and the airplane left suddenly one night, leaving a bunch of people holding worthless jump tickets O'Meara conned them into buying. On the engine failure flight, the rod broke, detached one cylinder from the case, cracked the case and left one of the fuel/air intake manifolds hanging loose, meaning a highly combustible mixture was being sprayed all over a windmilling engine. It was purely luck that the fire damage wasn't worse. When I explained to Hobbs, the copilot/mechanic with very little round motor time and 0 large airplane experience, just how hazardous a situation O'Meara had put him and the rest of the load in, Hobbs packed up his tools and left. Zing Lurks
  20. I had a little experience with two DHC-4 caribous that hauled jumpers. The first was one that Gary (Elevator) Olsen brought to Coolidge in 1988(?) where I hellped strip the paint, got a bit of time as copilot on, and made a few jumps out of before Gary and Larry Hill flew it to Africa for cargo work. The angle of attack on short final is somewhat disconcerting the first few times, but in the hands of a competent pilot, it has impressive performance capabilities. I considered Elevator a competent pilot, and I was pleased to get some stick time with him in this one. Zing Lurks
  21. Zing

    Bucket List

    Didja see his avatar? Zing Lurks
  22. Or (get your tinfoil hats on boys and girls) ... the miltary folks who worked on the radar tapes and data figured out exactly where Cooper got out of the airplane and did not disclose that info to the FBI as a matter of National Security ... or maybe perhaps for other, personal reasons? Zing Lurks
  23. will you come visit my porn forum? Of course I will! Can I be a moderator??? I'm good with boobies .... Hope so...not much with wood! I KNEW that was what you were going to say! You really need to get over your infatuation with wood ... Cut him a bit of slack, Shell, he already had a hell of time transitioning from the stone age ... all that bronze you know, and lugging that wood club around all those eons. Zing Lurks
  24. Sounds like he might also be suggesting that he's going to, and that other people should, too, modify their rigs into something that might not work. I distinctly recall hearing a well respected master rigger tell a friend of mine that his new rig didn't need that extra backstrap on the lower harness the manufacturer put on. And hotknifed it off. It was sewed right back on the rig after the first jump post removal when Lowjones found himself hanging upside down by his knees from the legstraps when he fell out of the upper harness. Zing Lurks
  25. "Would any of you make the following jump? Here are some facts to consider if he survived and if you could pull it off. The weather: Ceiling of 5,000 feet, broken clouds at 3,500, scattered clouds at 1,500. Winds of 12 to 14 knots, light rain showers. The jump: DB's chute was a military style 28' canopy. The planes speed was 173 knots when he jumped at 10,000 feet in full darkness. The landing: Forest with no lights. Possibly mountainous depending upon which theory you buy into." Whether it was 26' Navy conical or a 28' C-9 is irrelevant for a guy of the size and weight described, even one carrying an additional 22 lbs. of money. Lots of folks did hundreds of jumps landing the same round parachutes at weights over 200 pounds in "the good old days." I've not only jumped in similiar weather conditions, I've flown loads of jumpers in them too. Clouds don't hurt, rain does a little, but no big deal and broken layers means a modicum of visibilty to gauge altitude and to steer the canopy (such as one can with rounds) to landing. Winds of 12 to 14, a bit breezy, but lots of us jumped round parachutes in higher winds on a regular basis, and did night jumps with rounds too. Though a lot of the terrain was a challenge, there are many places along the supposed route, especially when considering the unknowns of the exact time/place of the jump, where the terrain had a lot of wide open space. The airplane actually flew over the general locations of two dropzones that night, didn't it? If Cooper knew anything about parachutes and jumping, the jump would have been a freefall delay to slow down. I'd rather dump a C-9 or Navy Conical at 170 knots than most of the squares I've jumped. Both the C-9 and the Navy Conical are built for that speed and higher. Very few squares are built as ruggedly. If his getaway after the jump was so poorly planned, where is he? Or any items he took with him? The parachute and harness he jumped, the dummy reserve that was no longer on the airplane, the briefcase, and whatever else the FBI knows he had that night. The placard that blew off the door was found, but nothing else of Cooper's was, until some of the money shows up on a beach by a river. One that, according to Safecracker, doesn't fit a location it could get to without a minor miracle, or by someone physically transporting it, to account for the bundles getting there. Hundreds of folks have spent many days tramping the woods and hills and waterways expressly seeking Cooper's parachutes, carcass, clothes and cash, not to mention the unknown numbers of hunters and fishermen that have been through the area too. Nothing found of Cooper's, but some folks did find an airman's body that had been hanging dead in the trees since a bailout from a military plane the 50s, if I recall correctly, and that, too, was not in the suspect landing area. Say he bounced in a body of water after failing to pull a ripcord ... and nothing else ever washes up except for a very small chunk of the cash. Seems to me, the Mt. St. Helens eruption was far enough south of the suspected landing area that the changes in the geography wouldn't have covered, or uncovered any evidence of Cooper, but I can't say that for certain. Any one know? Bottom line is, getting from the airplane to the ground intact, with or without the money, is definitely doable, even though its a high pucker factor jump. If he knew something of aviation and routes in the area, he could readily put himself into a specific area, give or take a mile or two, just by timing the flight and noting the turns onto course for the VOR's that make up Vector Airway 23. Getting away undetected after he landed presents a bigger obstacle than the jump itself. At this stage of the game, Ckret, you need to put some of those FBI computer nerds onto the task of using modern radar and computer technology into narrowing down a more exact location where Cooper left the airplane. I am willing to accept that Cooper might still be out there, dead in the woods, but if he is, then the question becomes, which neck of the woods is it. Zing Lurks