Skydive St. Louis http://www.skydivezion.com/

The History of Skydive St. Louis - Part Two

1996

In February Rick Segal organized the first winter skydiving trip to Las Vegas, where 15 St. Louis skydivers traveled to jump at Boulder City and in Jean Nevada for several days in 60 to 70 degree temperatures.

Obed Hall, a 72 year old one armed local pilot began flying for us. You should have seen the look on the faces of the first time skydivers when they would see that their pilot only had one arm. He was a great pilot and thoroughly enjoyed this new found aspect of avaition. Obed was the primary pilot for Jason Papke when he went through his AFF training in April. Jason was one of the few students to be able to combine several AFF jumps into one, and he graduated on only five AFF jumps.

Twice during this season we leased a Twin Bonanza airplane to come into Bowling Green and fly our skydivers. This is perhaps the loudest airplane used for skydiving and the town was quite tolerant of the roar and shaking of their homes as the plane flew overhead. We promised that we would not lease the airplane here again, but we had a great time with it while it was here.

Steve and Maria returned to work another season and lived upstairs in the airport hangar. Jeff Wagner became our rigger and gear salesman, and helped slowly push Skydive St. Louis into the modern era of zero-p canopies and expensive custom made gear. "Wags" helped rework much of our student and rental equipment, and also made quite a few tandem skydives for us. Within a few months there was new equipment everywhere.

1997

In spite of the previous financial setbacks, the student business and numbers of skydivers continued to grow at Bowling Green. At the beginning of 1997 Skydive St. Louis purchased their first twin engine airplane, a Cessna 411. The airplane was a project, and it took several months of long days and hard work to get it into safe flying condition. It was at this time that we were fortunate enough to find Mike Burris, a pilot and aviation mechanic that had flown for us previously on a part time basis. Mike became our full time pilot and became the positive force behind rebuilding the Cessna 411. The first flight with skydivers was in late July, and by mid September the 411 was flying up to ten skydivers a load up to 14000' on a regular basis, and has been ever since.

Bram Clement and Ellie Oskam came top Bowling Green as our full time staff for the first three months of the season, and then the last month and a half a Norwegian named Geir Trone stayed with us and helped train our tandem and AFF students.

Jean Potvin began making test skydives as a professional skydiver, because he was under contract by several different parachute manufacturers.

Don Mundschenk became our first skydiver to get injured doing a hook turn landing. These types of landings are not allowed at Skydive St. Louis, but Don did not do his intentionally. Of course the ground didn't care, and Don was lucky to escape with a fracture to his hip and a sore limp for the next few months when he walked. A year later he returned to make a few jumps with us.

We made our first demo jump into the new Quincy Gems baseball field in Illinois. Our second demo in July there was a poor spot by Rick Eddy, and Jean wound up landing several blocks away near some tennis courts. Even though every other skydiver before and since has landed on their field, it was Jean's landing in the residential section that everyone has joked about for years.

We began our skydiving picnic adventures, where we would locate a remote grass strip somewhere in the region and pick a weekday to jump there all day with a bar-be-que and picnic. These picnic days occurred as a result of Don Scheffler organizing many weekdays of skydiving at Bowling Green. As the numbers of weekday jumpers has grown, so has our opportunities to do a wider variety of activities during the week. Don has continued to organize weekday loads even to the present.

1998

The season begins with all kinds of excitement among the skydivers, but in mid- May there is a personality conflict among several jumpers that results in a segment of the experienced crowd moving to different operations in the St. Louis area.

Our twin engine Cessna 411 had both engines overhauled and was given a new paint job, which includes a huge bat painted on the entire belly and wings of the airplane.

We began to hold demonstration jump seminars taught by Joe Tabisola, who would train "D" license holders how to set up and perform demo jumps. The town of Bowling Green is so supportive of skydivers that we are able to do practice demo jumps all around the town. First we start with a jump into the Amish community, then into a local retirement home, and finally into the center of town into a soccer field next to Don's IGA.

1999

As we entered our tenth season in Bowling Green, there was a lot of great excitement for the season. Our Cessna 411, the twin engine airplane that took us to 14000' in 17 minutes, was in great shape, as was our 182.

Our only problem was personnel: Mike Burris, our main pilot for several years had been hired by TWE, and we needed another chief pilot. In May we hired a pilot who had twice as much experience as Mike Burris, but an immature personality and little common sense. Eric Arnold, the new pilot struggled to learn to fly the airplane correctly, and on his 3rd week after he had dropped a group of divers, he forgot to put the gear down when landing the airplane. Although the airplane repairs were covered by insurance, it took 3 months from the heart of our season to repair the airplane and by then all of the event plans for the operation had gone away.

But a more serious problem was affecting Skydive St. Louis, a problem that had been growing for years and had affected many dropzones; the lack of instructors. In the skydiving industry much of the instruction for students is done on a part time basis by people who have other full time jobs during the week. For years these people would spend 1/2 of their time at the airport working with students to help offset the costs of skydiving and aviation. But in the 1990's the economy improved year after year, people had more money and didn't need part time work in skydiving. The shortage of instructors is particularly noticeable in parts of the country where the skydiving year is limited by the seasons, like in Bowling Green where we get up to 5 good months and 3 weak months at best.

In 1994 we had 5 AFF instructors, 9 tandem instructors, 14 static line jumpmasters, 8 pilots, a fulltime packer, and a full time manifestor. By late 1999 we had one full time AFF and tandem instructor, 1 part time AFF instructor, 2 part time tandem instructors, a pilot and a manifestor. We could no longer cover the overhead costs of a small business that had continued to grow over the years into the main business on the airport. At the end of the 1999 season, the doors of the main building at the airport were closed and Rick Eddy relocated to St. George Utah.

Since that time many of the skydivers who were regulars at Skydive St. Louis have stopped skydiving, most citing the reason that they, "don't feel comfortable anywhere other than Bowling Green." Some have continued on at other locations in the St. Louis area like Don Scheffler, Jason Papke, Rick and Barb Segal, Henry Suter, Jean Potvin, Missy Spohr-Potvin, Steve MacAnulty and a couple others. But apparently most of the regulars are content with the friendships and experiences at Skydive St. Louis that the many great memories of these years will keep them smiling and telling stories for years to come!

There have been many fine people that have helped our drop zone survive and grow over the years. The following list is just a sampling - if you don't see your name or someone deserving, let us know:

Instructors/Pilots/Employees Bill Hayes Tom Gettemeyer Lonnie Lee Don Mundschenk Linda Collison Bob Russell Jim Fuhrmann Ben Messenger Randy Alley Steve MacAnulty John Bartis Linda Smith/Piatchek Henry Moyer Gary Peek Rex Krueger Don Krueger Audrey Jones Junior Riffle Melissa Krueger Lance Litton Mike Sims Larry Flanagan Kelly Crittenden Ron Lander Steve Hult Mark LaMartina Russ Simmons Steve Woodford Maria Wjnker Bram Clement Ellie Osklam Erik Kientzy Mike Burris Ken Callahan Dane Bowman John Tallman Henry Suter Jean Potvin Judy Hayes Greg Palmer Rick Segal Dave Steiferman Gier Tronnes Don Zarda Jerry Atkinson Pat Ensign Jeff Wagner Joe Rekart Dave DeRigne John Annon Matt Kleithermes Obed Hall Joe Tabisola Jason Papke Chris Loehner Chris Balk Mike Murrell

Other Special Contributors Tom Piatchek Bud Jones Lee Frey Bob Curtis Nikki Fuhrman Lori Effland John Fierke Donna Callahan Ken Callahan Pat MacInturf Warren Morrow Dane Bowman John Tallman Barb Segal Walter Ulrich Tim Kohler Mike LaMartina Martin Anders Don Scheffler Tom Dauphin Lew Welzel Jim Scherder Greg Poston Terri Poston Greg, Paul and Jeff Markowski Mary Beth Steve Wanthal Marina Wanthal Elizabeth Taliaferro Robert Smith Bob McKee Ed Henderson Roger Shinn Tamara Koyn Mark Welchert Kathy White/Standbridge Jim Lucas Bill Maschmeier Ed Maschmeier Dan Cytron Larry Bagley Missy Spohr Matt Stover Austin Smith Paul Deutsch Scott Adams