Butts Aerowing-The Only Way To Fly

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I've seen a picture in either Powerboat or Powerboat & Waterskiing (UK) of Renato Molinari in a tunnel coming apart after he applied a waterbrake. It was a new experiment and I believe it may have occurred in London at some anniversary celebration where Princess Margaret was in attendance. I bet some of the members over the pond might remember.

[John (Taylor) Gabrowski]

We were having a club develomental race at a place called Lockport. Similar to the name, we were above that giant mechanical weir with a nice short oval course. One driver, Jim Luzny was trying out his new copy of the much revered Giles pickelfork DSH and was really nicely hung in the air and all of a sudden he got punched knees first right through the hydro taking the steering wheel/hub and some cable with him and that long front cowl with him as he broke through it and ended about 50 feet up in front of the ignition killed boat. He hit a 2 X 12 waterlogged construction plank right on the end of his Merc gearcase torpedo! That was the water brake! How the gearcase survived that is still a mystery, the thing worked like a log splitter and turned the prop into junk, but man did he stop in a big hurry! Is that the idea of a water brake or not?

[Mark75H]

You can ask our member "hydroplanes" about that kind of stop. He had a piece of plywood skewered on his bullet and took a rocket ride thru the front framing and cowl of a Schumacher hydro .... a nanosecond before it nosedived. The wood was a half moon shape about 6" the long way

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Exiting before a nose dive is the preferred method regardless of speed. I once encountered a 2 X 12 myself on the Neches River in Beaumont, Texas. The river was in slight flood stage from heavy rains. Tommy Weatherbee from Corpus Christi hit something and flipped. In the process his own boat cut his left little finger off. Louis Williams was right behind him and turned right, I forget the other driver next to Louis' right , but he turned left. They crashed together. There were three guys in the water rushing downriver and it was all the rescue boat could do to catch up with Tommy. Then in the C Runabout race everyone jumped the gun but me. All I had to do was cruise to the finish. Suddenly a 2 X 12 that had been floating longways turned sideways and there was no place to go. I went over the top and the bolts holding my 2 cylinder C Konig pulled through the transom. I went forward over the steering wheel but all was OK until my bow hit the embankment. I had no steering and when the nose of my DeSilva hit I flew out onto the bank of the river.

[smittythewelder]

Well, ah, no that's not quite what I meant by a water brake!!!

Even though I had the foam padding on the floorboards, I still always wore kneepads just in case of some hard exit like that. I'd hate to go out of a lie-down boat head-first. Your head would probably be okay, but wouldn't you likely break arms, wrists, hands?? How are lie-down boats affecting injuries generally? They just look a little more dangerous to me than our old kneelers.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I only ran one a couple of years and to me the biggest problem was keeping tabs on the other drivers. It is much easier in a kneeler to know where the other drivers are. On the other hand, it is easier to stay in a laydown through hard turns when your sponsons are catching some hard waves and holes in the water. I don't know if a kneeler would be any safer if you stuff one. I couldn't walk for a week after my knees clipped the top of a steering wheel and my arms were all scratched up from the nails and wood that I went through. What was really scary with the laydown though was a fish I passed at Yelm. It was about 2-3 lbs. He jumped out of the water about level with my windshield and a couple of feet from my left sponson. From where I viewed it, it looked like it was shot out of a canon toward me. Don't know if the windshield would have deflected it or not. My mentor and old racing partner Clayton Elmer was knocked colder than a mackerel when he hit a fish in his kneeler.

[smittythewelder]

Funny! Years ago. Wartinger told me about making a kilo run at Delake when a seagull flew across the course and bounced off his helmet. Even though Bob was driving one of the small stock boats, he said the impact was tremendous.

[John (Taylor) Gabrowski]

Here I am watching a heat race at Beloit, Wisc and a D hydro driver caught that duck right in his chest at high speed and the duck deflected with its neck broke right down in front of the transom somehow. When he was asked what he was gonna do with that pretty male Mallard with the kinked neck, his response was simply he was gonna skin em and eat em!

Same day in another class heat after that one produced the duck this one was about a dumping and the pickup boat brought in the driver that had "his leg missing at the knee"! Well I freaked momentarily that he lost half his leg but calmed down when I realized seconds later it wasn't bleeding. By this time some people were in hysterics laughing at me! The other pickup boat was out there still too and came back with his hydro in one piece and his artificial leg as another piece too! He was so glad they found it and put it smack back on after he waved it at us with a smile and laugh because I suppose he knew it was freaken us so he played that to the hilt!

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Tommy Weatherbee flipped his B hydro and freaked out when he found the little finger on his hand (I forgot which one) was missing. Then all was OK when he realized it was the one he cut off at Beaumont a couple of years earlier.

[Guy]

Yeah Jeff, When I read Dan's post I thought about the same scenario that John posted. How scary. But that's not what happened. It's not clear to me, but if there is a rumour involving the chute it may go back to Ray Hardy. Tim, Ray and I think Bob Smith wore the parachutes. The only ones to flip with one one that I knew about were Ray and Tim.

Wasn't Jim Stone's death (in Elmer Grades 700) at Laredo mostly due to his Security Chute deploying?
I seem to remember hearing some opinions that had Jim NOT wore a chute, he "may" have lived.

Guy