C-119 Box Car?

[howardwhite 6]

I think you're right; I went by the label on the pic; not the first time lately I've been burned with bad info. I've jumped out of both normally-aspirated and turbo Porters.

Sheepishly yours,

HW

[NickDG 23]

I blew it too. I should have looked at the gear legs more closely, yes, the first one is a Porter . . .

NickD BASE 194

[Zing 2]

No worries youse guys ... its senioritis, and I suffer from it too often myself of late. Good thing we got Airtwardo running lead for us on the "old" jokes!

Zing Lurks

[Amazon 7]

I get to jump Jim Perrys current Porter every weekend.. and he let me jump out of his Courier too..pushed the back door open as he slowed it down to stall speed at 2500'..it was going so slow it was like a freakin BASE jump.

In Courier2 you can see the leading edge slats that pop out when you get really slow.


Now.. if he will just let me jump his Widgeon

[mccurley 1]

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Remember when skydivers would take one of those big ole altimeter dials

That was my first altimeter, and I still have a tooth with a bit missing from it!!

Watch my video Fat Women
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRWkEky8GoI

[NickDG 23]

Yes, the Courier is fully controllable down to about 35 knots or so and those leading edge slats bang in and out . . .

Tell Jim that Nick DiGiovanni said hello . . .

NickD BASE 194

[JSBIRD 1]

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Stalliion picture is definitely a Stallion; it says so on the cowl.

HW

The Helio Stallion in HW's second pic (N5779N) was Mike Mullins. It was totalled in a crash in Mobile, AL on 29SEPT1990. I missed the load by 15 minutes.
Since I was in the towing business and had enough equipment to recover the Stallion to a secure location, Mike gave me the OK to cut the wings off with a metal saw. That broke my heart, but the thing was in a helluva shape already.
From crashed to stashed was about 4 hours.

I think I still have a piece of the torn wing spar in my storage someplace.

BASE359

"Now I've settled down,
in a quiet little town,
and forgot about everything"

[JerryBaumchen 1,436]

Hi Nick,

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That same Stallion later crashed with a runaway electric trim switch at Perris killing the pilot. As the airplane tucked under, he blew the door and got out but the prop got him.

As soon as saw the picture I was sure it was the one owned by Jim Perry and in which Jim Lowe was killed.

Lowe never did get out of the plane; he did get the doors blown but it is thought (by a guy nick-named Elevator who is a great pilot and who flew commercial with Jim Lowe quite a bit and who was fairly knowledgeable on that aircraft) that Lowe fell into the instrument panel when undid his seat belt/harness to escape.

You are right on the money with the electric trim problem. The week before Lowe had the mechanics at Perris look into it because it had acted-up on a prior flight; they found nothing wrong with the trim.

I used to have the NTSB report on it but sent off to a friend in Australia.

The date of the crash was 30 Jun 88 and Jim Lowe was one of my best friends. JFK said it best when he said "Life is not fair."

JerryBaumchen

[debonair 0]

Hey Jer

Nice to see Jimmy's name pop up again. He was such an amazing individual. We were in awe of him and we knew he could fly anything, fix anything and I just loved his sh*t-eatin' grin. I remember he used to lean back on his emergency rig as a back rest but not wear it while flying. I asked him once about that and he said when he quit jumping he quit jumping. He didn't need the rig because he was done with it. Maybe he hit the panel but the way I heard it, was that the plane went in so quickly he couldn't have gotten out if he'd wanted to.

The Lord bless him and his memory, they just don't make 'em like that any more.

AZChallenger JFTC99/02 GOFAST300 STILLUV4WAY
"It's nothing 1000 jumps won't cure..."
- Jeff Gorlick, Seattle Sky Divers

[JSBIRD 1]

The aircraft in which Jim Lowe was killed was N9991F.
The NTSB report is available online here.... http://www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/brief.asp?ev_id=20001213X25979&key=1

BASE359

"Now I've settled down,
in a quiet little town,
and forgot about everything"

[JerryBaumchen 1,436]

Hi Jay,

I went to your 'clicky' and found about one paragraph and a couple of sentences. The report I had was about 4-5 pages and maybe a 1/2 dozen photos.

Not being negative; just commenting.

JerryBaumchen

PS) Deb, Elevator said that would Jim wear his pilot rig when flying that bird; and he believed that he was trying to get out when it went in. My thinking is why would he blow the doors unless he wanted to get out. The lone 'eye witness' (an ultalight pilot flying in the area) said that the plane first nosed over about 1300-1500 feet, it then came back nose level or so, the doors blew and it nosed over again and went it.

A couple months before it happened I was having dinner with Jim in the Issaquah area (we go back to when I first started jumping in early '64 and we were born the same year) and we got talking about life and things in general. He told me that he had it in his will that he was to be cremated and scattered within 24 hours of his death. I heard about the crash in the afternoon of that day, called to Perris and talked to Jim Perry about trying to get Lowe to a crematorium as soon as possible. But Perry was nervous about doing anything (only Jim's attorney & Jamie Woodward had copies of his will) and by the next day Jim's family in West Virginia got involved and stopped everything. They called the shots after that. But he did finally got cremated and then scattered out of a P-51, his last flight.

[NickDG 23]

I first met Jim Perry when he'd dropped in out of the blue at Borderland in San Diego in the late 80s. Turbine aircraft were the hot thing to have and Jim's Stallion wasn't only that - it was a brute of an airplane that made Twin Otters look like the mailman's truck.

After we hooked up he brought it up a shop I was working at on Oceanside airport and we did some maintenance on it, but in addition I installed a killer stereo system for the cabin. This was the pre-Ipod days and some DZ's were touting rock and roll to altitude.

That New Year's Eve, the Stallion had been at the DZ for a few weeks. And at that time the Perris DZ had two things most other So Cal DZ's didn't have. A pool and a grass landing area. So Don Muma, the San Diego DZO at the time, knew he couldn’t put anything up besides a pathetic plastic pool so he seeded and watered long enough that he raised a decent side patch of grass that, at least, we could pack on. (Landing on it would get you grounded).

So anyway that New Year's Eve we decided to pull the Stallion up onto the grass and jam the stereo. And Don blew a fuse because it was sitting on the grass. We all told him to go F-himself and there was a big-to-do. The next morning Jim left and I went with him. We'd heard that Lake Elsinore was re-opening after the latest flood and we headed there.

So we took off, but we needed fuel, so we stopped first at Montgomery Field. We had the stereo cranking Led Zeppelin's "Houses of the Holy" and the tower asked us to "get the Led out," as they couldn’t hear anything but that on the radio . . .

That airplane really drew a crowd. The Stallion was basically sold to the CIA in the 60s to be used in getting in and out of small jungle strips in Vietnam. Sometimes it was to drop in special teams, but usually it was to bring money and weapons, and whatever else, to friendly villagers.

So we landed at Lake Elsinore and it was only a few days since Deborah Blackman, and her husband Brick, had re-opened the DZ. After introductions she said looking at Jim, "Okay, you’re my new chief pilot," and looking at me, "and you're my new chief Instructor.

It was pretty cruisey for the next few years . . .

And how Jim Lowe died in that same Stallion was the way we all heard it at the time. This is the first I've heard something different.

NickD BASE 194

[debonair 0]

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Deb, Elevator said that would Jim wear his pilot rig when flying that bird

Not sure how true it is but I had heard that Jim supposedly said the Stallion was the only plane that scared him. In any regards he was a legend and still is a fond memory. We've lost too many friends over the years...

AZChallenger JFTC99/02 GOFAST300 STILLUV4WAY
"It's nothing 1000 jumps won't cure..."
- Jeff Gorlick, Seattle Sky Divers

[Beerlight 0]

As a young C-182 jump pilot from San Antonio sent down to Beeville for a boogie in 88 or 89? that featured Mikes Stallion (79N), I jumped at the chance to "ride" up/down with him.

Absolutely an unbeliveable aircraft. Mike used a damn stick to close the door, descended like an anvil, much ground rush, slowed to 40ts, made a fucking hard turn and landed on one of Gary's fucked up runways!! Anybody at that boogie? Ah, the memories...........

[royboy1140 0]

you must be a real hero

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