St. John 1999 Fly-Fest - The fun before the fun...

This year's festivities started Thursday, two days before the event. Several pilots were going to fly Friday, the day before the meet, and came up Thursday to camp. Scot Huber was one of those pilots. As he was driving through Santa Rosa the motorcycle he was carrying on the back bumper of his truck became detached at the top. The wheels were still firmly attached to the bumper. The bike began to drag on the road and fuel began to leak out of the tank. Sparks from the dragging bike then ignited the fuel. A motorist alerted Scot and he stopped in the middle of Fourth St., near Farmers Lane, and tried to separate the bike from the truck. When he cut the straps and drove ahead, the burning cycle's spokes caught on the bumper and followed. By now there was quite a scene and an employee of the Park Walker liquor store ran out with a fire extinguisher and put out the blaze. The damage included the burned up motorcycle, blistered paint on the back of the truck, and a slightly melted nose on his glider. Not really melted, just deformed from the heat.

The excitement continued on Friday. Scot, Ernie, Todd and I flew Friday. Scot and Ernie flew to the lake. Todd and I went XC to the north. I landed at the junction of Hwy 16 and Stonyford Road. After being retrieved by Linda Sauer, we headed north in Ernie's Land Curiiser to chase Todd, who was doing well. We stopped on Lowery Road north of Paskenta to get a visual on Todd. He saw us stop and radioed that he was a couple of miles ahead and had just topped out in a thermal at 5000 ft. We continued driving north. Todd was getting further ahead. As we rounded a left-hand curve, the rear of the Land Cruiser slid out on some washboard that was concealed by recent road grading. The road shoulder was soft from the grading and the rear wheels caved it into the ditch. The bank of the ditch was steep and deep, grabbing the rear wheel. The Land Cruiser slowly began to roll over. At less than 5 mph, the action was agonizingly slow. I had time to say to Linda "This thing is going to roll over!", and slowly it did. We ended up completely upside down across the ditch, with the weight of the truck on my CSX.

Transmission oil immediately began draining and running off the shifter, getting all over everything on the ceiling of the truck, which was now below us. This was a very disorienting position. We unclipped and got out of the driver side window. Linda was able to roll it down, er, up, uh, open it. Linda, having seen plenty of movies, was certain the truck would explode into flames at any instant. I assured her that everything had happened too slowly for that.

I radioed to Todd that the retrieve was off, due to the fact that the wheels of the truck were in the air. Our radio signal wasn't good, since the antenna was under the truck with the Funship 5 (my CSX). Todd got the message but did not believe me at first. I told him he could go on if he wanted, but that we couldn't chase him anymore. Todd was at 5000 ft., at the 45-mile mark and going on glide to the north. Instead of going for the Coffee Can record (longest flight for the year from a club site), he turned around and flew about seven miles back to us.

No one was hurt. The truck sustained medium body damage only. We had it towed back to camp where Rich (Linda's husband, owner of a transmission shop) checked it out and gave it his blessing. Ernie was able to drive it home. It will take a while to get the smell of transmission oil out of it. The glider suffered the most. It seems they weren't designed to take the weight of a Toyota Land Cruiser sitting on them. The fate of the Funship 5 is still an unfinished story, which I will update after the final outcome.

Charlie Warren

Epilogue:

The damage to the Land Cruiser was enough that the insurance company totaled it. So sad, especially since Ernie had just had the body's dings taken out and a new paint job applied a year before (after jack-knifing his camping trailer at last year's fly-in). Ernie bought the truck back from the insurance company, replaced the cracked windshield and broken turn signal lenses, and the Land Crusher lives still, though he now calls it his Jeckel / Hyde truck - left side beautiful, right side UGLY. The transmission oil smell never did go away. Charlie's CSX was also totaled, but his insurance settlement was enough for him to replace it - with a Wills Wing Fusion.

As for the meet, that's another story...