>Chris, I'm impressed.....and amazed that you survived that one.
>
>I had a malfunction of a ski on Cessna 180 ski plane in Alaska one time.
>The thing put me through an outside loop and between some treetops before
>I got control of the situation. Damn near lost it.  If I had not had my
>seatbelt on I would have been thrown all over the cockpit, so guess where
>today I would be........or not be?
>
>Airplane or car, seatbelts are common sense.
>

        True...a harness saved my face and upper body parts from severe
        damage when the nose of the tandem trainer I was  in the front
        seat of stopped suddenly after passing through the after run
        at the end of the runway as a result of total brake failure.
        As the check pilot/instructor in the back seat was screaming
        "EJECT! EJECT" I was trying to remind him that this particular
        trainer model NEVER had ZERO ALTITUDE ejection seats. He sounded
        pretty silly trying to defend that particular instruction during
        the subsequent inquiry. Last I heard, he was keeping tabs on snow
        removal equipment in Thule Greenland...

        I was carted away from the crash site with broken knees and one
        fractured lower leg. I had plenty of time to contemplate the
        future of my flying career while recuperating ;^)

        Silly me...once I recovered enough to drive, I rolled my VW beetle
        out by Van Horn (Tx) at about 70mph dodging a jackrabbit that was
        bigger than a cocker spaniel. This time, wearing three point seat
        belts,  I was able to walk away from the rollover with a few
        bruises.

        Same decade (but during later 60s), I rear ended a car in fog at
        about 20 mph wearing a seat belt, and walked away...only later
        after getting my car fixed to slide on black ice on a decreasing
        radius turn at about 60mph into a powerpole. Of course I was
        wearing three point belts in the Volvo and found out that Volvos
        were solidly made...the power pole ended up between the right
        front wheel and the engine, almost all the way to the firewall.
        The passenger compartment wasn't deformed. And the windshield
        wasn't damaged!

        I ALWAYS BUCKLE UP!

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  You can't depend on your judgement when your imagination is out of focus.
                                                          -- Mark Twain.
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        OLTECO                    Ari Ollikainen
        P.O. BOX 3688             Networking Architecture and Technology
        Stanford, CA              Ari@OLTECO.com
        94309-3688                415.517.3519