View Single Post
Old 04-16-2019, 02:55 PM   #83
DeepPurple DeepPurple is offline
I could of gone pro
 
DeepPurple's Avatar
 

Join Date: Aug 2001
Location: The Villages, Florida
Casino cash: $10005676
In 1975 my first wife and I each bought new Kawasaki street bikes. She had never driven a bike before, but she picked it up quick. The first day she wanted to ride it to her job at Albertson in St. Petersburg, about a ten mile ride. I rode with her and she got there OK. I went back down to ride home with her at 4pm rush hour. We were about halfway home and a car turned left behind me and in front of her. She ran into the side of the car, but went in at the wheel well and was going only about 25mph. Very little damage to the bike and her.

About a week later, her bike is fixed and were out riding around in Largo, north of St. Pete, we're on a 4 lane divided road going 55mph and I'm about a 1/4 mile ahead. We enter a big curve and as I lean left into the turn I lose sight of her in the mirror, and a car was in the left turn lane. I looked back over my left shoulder to see her, and when I look back my front wheel is hitting the curb. I rolled off the back of the bike into the dirt and concrete medium and was skinned up on both legs and arms but no broken bones. I had on shorts and a t-shirt when didn't help. Fortunately I had on a helmet with a full face shield which did help since and all the snaps on the shield were totally flat.

I had some incidents where those around me got killed. In 1970 I was stationed in Korea in the DMZ and it was a usual night, I was playing cards with the guys at the coffee shop. The next day, the SSgt that was playing at my table went hunting with the Colonel in one of Hueys, just imagine Mash and it's for real. The Sgt stepped on a land mine that was planted 20 years earlier during the Korean War and was killed.

March 1977 I was working as a air traffic controller at St. Petersburg/Clearwater Control Tower and I was the tower controller for all 3 intersecting runways. I had departures leaving on Rwy 35R and 35L, I had full stops on Rwy 9 and I had touch & goes on Rwy 22. The touch & goes were mostly students flying Grumman Americans out of Nat'l Aviation Academy. I had 4 Grumman in right traffic on Rwy 22 and I saw one turn base too early and was at about 900' on final and directly above the aircraft he was following. I could of sent him around but since he was still at pattern height and there wasn't anyone on downwind, I told him he was overtaking his traffic and to make a right 360 and re-enter on final. I looked back at my other traffic on Rwys 9 & 35 and I heard an ELT (Emergency Locator Transmitter) go off. This happens a lot, radio shops are always testing them, but it did get my attention, so I looked back at final for Rwy 4 and I didn't see the aircraft that should of been rolling out of his 360 by now. I had sheriff helicopter inbound, so I asked him if he could go down south and look around for the aircraft.

My union rep relieved me from the position and I went over to the back of the tower and was looking with binoculars for the aircraft when the phone rang. I picked it up and the voice said, "This is Arch Deal of Channel 8 Reports, Live on the Air, what information can you give us about the aircraft that just crashed on 49th Street." I grew up in St. Pete, and knew Arch Deal since I was a kid, and now he's on the phone telling me this aircraft has crashed. I told him, no comment, and hung up. Both pilots, the student and the Vietnam Vet former Army helicopter pilot were both killed.

About a year later in May 1978 I was working in Pensacola Approach Control (radar controller). Our ILS Runway was closed for repaving and we had no instrument landing available other than a controller instructed Surveillance Approach to Rwy 9/27. We had heavy thunderstorms coming through the area and National 193 from Tampa was inbound and wanted a surveillance approach. My team was working that night, the controller next to me was handling final approach. Most of us never do surveillance approaches, or at least not since our military days. It's where you give detailed instructions to the pilot and he follows those instructions until he sees the runway. His altitude is determined by already published altitudes, the MDA for this approach to Rwy 27 was 520 feet. Runway 27 final is over Pensacola Bay for about 5 miles with the last mile over houses and the shoreline is rather step for Florida, it's like California with a 100' cliff. Around two mile final the pilots mistook a barge and it's lights in the bay for the runway, and with gear and flaps down made a perfect landing on the water. Fortunately only 3 people died, they drown but the barge was able to pick up most of the survivors. The aircraft did not break up and was sold about a month later for a $1 million dollars and floated up and taken away.

Had crash happened a mile later, it would of been a total disaster.



Posts: 1,340
DeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby PiscitelliDeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby PiscitelliDeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby PiscitelliDeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby PiscitelliDeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby PiscitelliDeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby PiscitelliDeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby PiscitelliDeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby PiscitelliDeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby PiscitelliDeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby PiscitelliDeepPurple 's adopt a chief was Sabby Piscitelli
    Reply With Quote