towpilot2003

I flew the Otter (In the hangar scene and interior shots)from Perris to Hawthorn in LA spending the day on set. When I landed the covered up the SKYDIVE PERRIS and changed the N number immediately before shooting. Just a big white sticker. They did have some very experienced skydivers on scene getting as much of the story accurate but honestly to make anything Hollywood you have to bend many realities we all saw on TV. That's typical Hollywood, entertain the Wuffo's. The writers were being educated on the spot as best they could be... trust me. All of the air to air shots were filmed Near Vandenburg air force base in California (you can see the base in the free fall scene). The reason was the Ocean, the sorta kinda flat farm looking area (Like Florida) and being located near HollyWood. The Caravan was used to keep cost down of the production, pretty self explanatory... The wife: In the show, she's an old battle ax, the "stand in" actress for the wife (Stand ins used to set up camera angle etc) was way hotter, I'm just sayin, should have used her ;-) I've done a few Hollywood-ish productions and I was told something by Scott Smith (regional director) a while back, "Movies are like sausages, the finished product is good, but you don't want to see how they're made." So with that we'll just have to deal with terribly inaccurate skydiving scenes from Hollywood until writers and producers can deal with their ego and "creative genius" not being interrupted :-)

PERRIS. Has everything you need for a long stay. Pool, Food, Room, Gear, and Load Organizing with a welcoming atmosphere regardless of experience level. Elsinore is close by as well, only 20 Minutes by car. You get two drop zones for the price of one ticket from Heathrow. Plus it's close to many other activities as well.

By repairs, I assume you mean fuel was added to the empty tanks? I'm not intimate with the Skyvan's systems, but I am with the Metro (same engines) and I can't think of any electrical problem that would cause both engines to lose fuel. Even if all the fuel pumps lose their power source (complete electrical failure), the engines should keep running. No the tanks were not emptied, i watched as the plane was pulled into the hangar, worked on and test flown with out adding a drop. As you know with the Garetts, they require and electrical signal to shut down. For some strange reason the fuel control units recieved that signal and shut down. (Voltage spike??) Anyway this is one of those really rare things that has happened to other TPE-331's in the past.