Page 26 - July18T

This brand new black Cadillac was totaled following an unexpected rst ight.
student line guy, sets off like a drunken drag racer down the unlighted taxiway with the throttle floored.
Doing well over 100 mph, and with the paved terminus of the taxiway not at all visible in the dark, he runs onto the grass. Fifty feet off the taxiway and not at all visible on this dark night, there is a four-foot high berm of grass covered dirt. The berm launches the high-speed, black Cadillac about 20 feet into the air vertically, and sends it flying down range nearly 100 feet before it finally touches down with a very high- G landing. The vehicle’s undercarriage was not designed to handle this kind of load, and so the car bottoms out, tearing off the exhaust and breaking the suspension.
José also suffers a high G-load impact, which takes him 10 minutes to recover from. Once again alert, he discovers the previously spotless car is covered with grass, clods of dirt and white mud. With the optimism only youth can provide, he decides that if he takes it back to the FBO’s airplane
was not in the least worried. And, con- sistent with his conscientious reputa- tion, José moved the CJ over to the owner’s hangar, even carefully position- ing and chalking the tires exactly on the marked positions on the hangar floor before disconnecting the tug, just as he had been trained to by the FBO’s owner.
But then, on his way to push the but- ton that controls the hangar door, he could not help but notice the brand new black Cadillac eying him in a most se- ductive manner from the hangar’s cor- ner. Out of youthful and innocent curi- osity, José opened the door and sat in it. He had heard that you could hardly hear
the engine run on these luxury cars, and with the key sitting right there on the passenger seat, his mechanically ori- ented mind could not help but wonder if that was really true. So, he started it up. Once that far, with the engine silently running and the hangar door still wide open, he thought a little drive in and out of the hangar would certainly not hurt anything. Once on the ramp with no one around, he decided it might be harmless fun to just take a short drive down the empty, unlit taxiway. Having safely accomplished that, the next inev- itable question was, how fast does this thing go? And so, our sober, straight-A
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24 • TWIN & TURBINE
July 2018