Backcountry Pilot • Goose wreck

Goose wreck

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Goose wreck

Anyone know the story behind this one? I can't for the life
of me figure out what the pilot was trying to attempt and/or
why....

http://www.havasreti.com/images/goose.wmv
1954C180 offline
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Bela P. Havasreti
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Ah, first attempt at trying to step taxi a goose??? Damn, that's an expensive boo boo.

Mark
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That's hard to watch.
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Sounds like he's jockeying the throttles trying to get it straightened out..or something. Not much left to do at that point. At first I thought I was watching the Budweiser Hydroplane raceboat.
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jmtgt wrote:My guess it was a condemed airframe with a ferry permit and they wrecked it while making a movie or something. Some of the sound did not match the engines and what not. Oh well just my thoughts on the subject.

It was very impressive!!!!


You get a virtual cigar....

Word has it the clip is from the movie "The endless Summer II"
which came out in 1994 (it's supposed to be a surfing movie of
some kind). Shame on the director(s) for wrecking / damaging
what appears to be a decent looking Goose!
1954C180 offline
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Bela P. Havasreti
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It is from "endless summer two" a seriously kick-ass movie about surfing.(if you enjoy that kind of thing. If not I suspect it's a bit like your non-flying friends being forced to sit through another aviation film. :roll:) Our first reaction to that scene was what the hell!? Like, geez dude, you don't chow a perfectly good airplane for a couple seconds of screen time. Like, that totally bites dude! :D OK, enough, I'm gone. --AJ
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I doubt it was intentional. I think the story is that the pilot dropped some guys off and decided to step taxi around a corner at high speed and wadded the Goose. Brown just happened to get it on film.

Speaking of Dana Brown(son of Bruce) has anyone seen his movie Dust to Glory, about the Baja 1000? It's supposed to be Endless Summer 2/Riding Giants quality.

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From dpearce on SuperCub.org:

Rather long account of what happened to cause the accident and it's outcome.

WILD GOOSE
Back in the “olden days”, when Tamarindo was a small village and everyone knew everyone else, filmmaker Bruce Brown chose the town to shoot a segment for his new movie "Endless Summer II". The sequel to the famous surfing movie "Endless Summer" came a generation later than the original, and, of course, featured new stars: Wingnut and Pat O'Connor, together with one of the originals, Robert August.

Living in Flamingo at that time was a pilot, "Hoot" Gibson, who had spent several years obtaining his commercial licence in Costa Rica. Hoot owned a vintage Grumman Goose seaplane, relic of World War II, and intended to charter it for tours. Given the state of the roads then - and not much improved since - a seaplane seemed the way to go to explore a country surrounded by sea.

Robert August had a fine idea: To charter the Goose to fly the film crew and its surfers around the coasts of Costa Rica, Nicaragua and Panama, looking for unknown or little-known surf spots to shoot their sequences. Apart from being much faster to cover more area, the aircraft was highly superior to a boat, which could only examine the waves from the "back", or ocean, side whereas a 'plane could approach from the landward side, too. "Endless Summer II" was Hoot's first charter in Costa Rica, and was to last two weeks.

On the first day, the Goose took off from the airport. The plan was to fly out to Cabo Velas, return along Playa Grande and land in the bay near Tamarindo estuary, where the crew would board, then to take off on their adventures.

The camera crew set up on Tamarindo Beach, ready to shoot the approach and landing for the movie. But instead of flying from Cabo Velas, approaching Tamarindo from the west along the Playa Grande coastline, the big Grumman twin came roaring down the river from the north, putting on a show for the camera. On board were the pilot, "Hoot" Gibson, and local resident and California board shaper, the late Mike "Doc" Diffenderfer.

Approaching Tamarindo, the pilot started a right turn to follow the estuary, but his height was insufficient. Presumably he suddenly became aware of the power lines which cross the river at that point, and was forced to fly below them. The right pontoon caught the water, and jerked the aircraft to the right. Overcorrecting, the pilot put the left float into the water, and the aircraft swerved to that side.

Gibson applied full take-off power to get the aircraft back into the air, but it careered from the river onto the beach, where it ground-looped and came to a stop. The whole incident was filmed, and eventually became part of the movie.

"At this point," said August, "we saw fuel spraying from the aircraft onto the sand, and there was a distinct danger of a fire or explosion. As we approached the 'plane, the doors opened and Hoot and Doc jumped out, fortunately both unhurt. From a nearby beach house, a resident came running, carrying a big club and shouting at the pilot that he was in a national park, and polluting the beach. We managed to calm him down, and the incident ended at that point."

Eyewitness Dean Butterfield adds: “I was up the hill looking over the estuary, watching Hoot Gibson fly the plane through it. He was doing touch and go’s in the estuary, I was wondering why he felt he had to do that in there. As he came out to the mouth I think he saw the cable stretched across at the last minute and tried to duck under it. He caught the wing tip and stuffed it into the sand.

By the time I got down to it, there were a lot of people around. I took pictures and made a T-shirt from one.”

Officials of Minae also attended the site very shortly after the accident, and charged the pilot with flying in a protected zone (Parque Marina las Baulas). As a result, Gibson's licence, obtained over several years, was withdrawn after one brief flight.

"As it happened, the club-bearing resident did quite well out of the crash." August continues. "The plane suffered damage to a wing and one of the propellers, and parts for a vintage seaplane are not procured at your local NAPA store, so the aircraft had to sit for a year or so while repairs were made. During this time the aircraft was parked in the resident's back garden, he and his family being paid for caretaker duty against theft or vandalism. I believe someone of the family slept in their garden ornament every night."

The day after the accident, filming continued with a scene where supposed crash passengers August, Wingnut and Pat O'Connor climb cheerfully from the Goose, carrying their boards, and run off to the surf.

Seriously concerned that accident investigators or other officials might confiscate the film shot up to that point, Director Bruce Brown hired a friend to hop a Sansa flight to San José, thence to Los Angeles for processing. Fortunately, the film escaped customs examination but, arriving in Los Angeles, it was delayed a couple of days en route for the processing studio by the Rodney King riots, which occurred in the vicinity of the studio.

The Goose was eventually repaired and flown out of Tamarindo.
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Funny, there is another pilot named Hoot Gibson.
Image
Image

Couldn't be the same guy. I wonder how many "Hoot" Gibsons ther are out there?
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