"Letters from the Air Boss" is a bi-monthly column written by John Dudley Barksdale, aviation enthusiast and Air Boss for many local air shows, that appears in the print version of Virginia Aviation.
Dear Friends of Aviation,
In August, I was invited to attend the National Skydiving Museum Weekend honoring Joe Kittinger in Deland, Fla. with long-time Flying Ace’s Skydiver Gerald (Jerry) Gravitt of Halifax County. Along the way we picked up Bill Woods, one of the ringleaders of POPs (Parachutists Over Phorty Society www.thepops.org ), and colorful jump plane pilot, Linton Moore.
A local legend for 40 years, Jerry has thrilled thousands, supporting numerous charities in fund raising events as a skydiver. For a guy who has jumped as Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, to say he is a character is an understatement. There are a lot of characters in aviation; that’s one of the ingredients that make it so magical.
The highlight of the weekend was meeting Colonel Joe Kittinger II, famous for his participation in Project Excelsior—a series of high-altitude parachute jumps in 1959 and 1960. Kittinger set the current world records for the highest parachute jump (102,800 ft.). During the descent, he experienced temperatures as low as −94 °F. In the free-fall stage, he reached a top speed of 614 mph— setting a record for the fastest speed by a human through the atmosphere. The whole descent took 13 minutes and 45 seconds.
The Project Excelsior, an equipment testing project for what would become NASA, answered many questions that before had only been theorized. Kittinger’s leap did much to insure the chance for survival of pilots or astronauts who may have to bail out of high-altitude crippled ships. His efforts gave our cold war effort U-2 Pilots a chance to fly again another day.
Currently two rival daredevils are fiercely competing to be the first to surpass Joe in his altitude jump record and two men have died attempting to break it.
Col. Kittinger was among an inaugural group of 10 others being inducted into the new National Skydiving Museum and Hall of Fame, soon to be built in Fredericksburg www.skydivingmuseum.org . These awards were long overdue for a group of people that have made a permanent mark in skydiving history.Like many of you in aviation, I have always enjoyed seeing the sky divers perform at air shows and admired our past and current military airborne members. I made my first jump in 1974 at New River Valley Airport under a most talented Jumpmaster, John Stanford.
I remember that crisp fall day late in the evening when we went up in a Cessna 182 to do a static line jump from 3,500 AGL. In fact, it was so late in the evening that when we got to altitude, John raised the door looked out and looked back at his panic stricken fledglings and yelled over the wind “Guys, I’m sorry it’s too late to jump today, if you went out now and there was a problem, we may be recovering you in the dark and that would not be safe”. So with great dismay, back to earth we descended in the name of safety. I had to wait a week before I could return to complete my jump. I contemplated a hundred times over, do I really want to do this? I finally rationalized that as an aviator if I ever found myself wearing a parachute and needed to get out of a plane in a hurry that this training would be beneficial.
That still didn’t stop me from saying a prayer before I leaped acknowledging that I was probably going to die and admitting that if I didn’t jump I would be a coward to myself. Well, I made my jump, the beautiful round T-10 canopy deployed and I lived to tell this tale. Yes, I had a bad parachute landing fall (PLF), broke my ankle, admitting I had good training and did not follow through with what I had been taught, but went back six weeks later after cutting off my own cast and was totally successful.
When I spoke with Col. Kittinger I learned we had one thing in common and it certainly wasn’t the height or level of bravery of our jumps. I said “Colonel, I have a question for you, when you were at altitude and getting ready to make your jump, what was the last thing you did before stepping off your platform?” “John,” he answered, “I said a prayer and then I took a leap of faith.”
You know, I knew exactly what he meant.
CAVU,
John Dudley Barksdale
