MCRCS Bomb Drop Contest

2008 Bomb and Parachute Drop and Cub Day

Carl Gubkin is recognized as the father of the Bomb Drop Contest.

Feszchak Bomb
Jim Feschak set an impossibly high standard with the first drop of the day.

Measuring
Rich Lee and Jim Van Buren watched as Carl measured Jim Feszchak's drop to the fractional inch.

Jim Van Buren's large fluorescent orange bomb was easy to spot ...

Van Buren Drop
... which was helpful when it landed somewhere distant from the target.

Jans Brower handily won the Parachute Drop with two misses and a crash.

Three-time winner John Tanzer could'a been a contender, if he'd gotten the @#$% engine started.

Local reporter Jennifer Kohlhepp of the Examiner considered bombs falling in Assunpink Park big news.

Super Cub
It was also Piper Cub Day at Warren Kruse Field.

Twin Cubs
Rich Green and Dan Geerders flew matching Super Cubs.

Jim and Pat Meighan flew conventional Cubs.

Gubkin Cub
Carl Gubkin combined events, dropping bombs from a Cub.

Gubkin Deadstick
Deadstick landings seemed common this day.

Meighan Deadstick
In general, the cubs handled them well.

Lazy Bee
Others were less successful.

Instruction
Meanwhile, despite falling bombs and deadstick landings, there's always time ...

... to provide flight instruction to a pretty girl, in this case Jim's daughter, MicKayla.

With light winds and 68-degree temperatures on Sunday, October 5th, it was one of those days when no one paid much attention to the clouds that covered much of the western sky. The sun was out, our jackets were doffed, and there was excitement in the air.

Even those who hadn’t read their club calendars would have known something was up by the large circle that was painted on runway with the numbers 3, 4, and 5 in the successively tighter circles. And at 10:00, what was up became apparent as bombs began to fall from the model aircraft as they made low passes over the target.

As contest director Carl Gubkin can attest, these contests usually begin with apparent disregard for the painted circles, most bombs and parachutes falling somewhere on the runway or the adjoining cornfields. It usually takes several attempts before anything falls in the circles. This year, however, Jim Feszchak wasn’t following the playbook and, on the first drop of the day, managed to put his bomb near the center circle of the target, resulting in an immediate accrual of four points.

This unprecedented occurrence drew the close attention of Carl Gubkin, who measured the distance of Jim’s bomb from dead center with split-inch accuracy. Last years winner, Rich Lee, watched the measurement with earnest regard. Then, as if to affirm the new skill level of the Mercer County crew, or perhaps as a more personal affirmation, Rich Lee took off and planted a bomb directly in the center circle, garnering five points for himself.

Of course, not everyone demonstrated the skill levels that seemed apparent in these two masters. Jim Van Buren, who possessed what appeared to be the largest and most colorful bomb of the competition, twice failed to penetrate even the outer ring of the target. While Jim didn’t show any outward indication of despair, a certain webmaster with a comparable record after two tries was ready to withdraw from the contest at that point, acknowledging his own deficiencies in relation to the far superior skills of his competitors.

But then an odd thing happened. Both Van Buren and that certain webmaster managed to break the outer barrier to score three points each in two drops that marked the only other attempts to successfully hit the target all day. Feszchak and Lee, however great their skills might have been, were unable to plant another bomb in the circles in their remaining four attempts.

In planning a battle, there are issues of strategy and of tactics. Regarding the former, Jans Brower seemed to find the winning strategy in the day’s contests. Jans easily won the parachute contest with his three drops. The first two completely missed the target, which is not unusual for the Parachute Drop Contest. His third also missed the target, but so intent was Jans on willing the parachute into the circle that he forgot to fly his airplane, which had an unexpected and undesired encounter with the ground. Fortunately the damage was limited to a prop and the landing gear. His only competition, Carl Gubkin, lost his parachute in the adjoining corn field on his first attempt, thus ending the contest.

Of course it all could have been different if John Tanzer had managed to get the engine started on his Quaker. Winning the parachute contest every year thus far and the bomb drop one out of two, John could have been a serious contender. But such was not to be. (Jans, what was that you put in John’s fuel? Yeah, the white, powdery stuff.)

With the excitement of the bomb and parachute drops, sometimes it’s easy to forget that this event is also Cub day, the one day of the year when everyone is supposed to bring a Piper Cub to the field. This year there were more Cubs than bombs, so many that there seemed to be yellow airplanes everywhere you looked. Of course not all Cubs are yellow. Rich Green and Dan Geerders came with almost identical red-and-white Super Cubs. The only way to tell the difference was by knowing that Rich’s was powered by gas and Dan’s by glow.

While Cubs are pretty to look at and fun to fly, it really takes something extra to make them exciting, like a Flying Farmer routine or a dead stick landing. We didn’t have a Flying Farmer, but Pat Meighan did perform a few deliberate ground loops and fly down the runway sideways a time or two. And both Jim Meighan and Carl Gubkin experienced dead stick landings, but except for the fact that the propellers weren’t turning, the landings looked pretty routine. However, when an odd looking yellow model named the Lazy Bee tried it, the landing didn’t work out so well; a too-steep approach sans flare left large pieces of the Bee scattered on the runway.

Some may have noted that the event was covered by the press. Jennifer Kohlhepp, a reporter for the local Examiner, along with photographer Scott and videographer Jamie, spent a couple of hours learning some details about our club. It would be tempting to suggest that Jennifer was intrigued by the idea of bombs falling in Assunpink, but in fact she had been trying to write an article on our club for a couple of weeks and this was the first time the weather cooperated. We’ll all look forward to seeing what she writes.

Even though bombs, parachutes, and Cubs dominated the day, there was still time in the sky for a large-scale Yak and an EDF foamie. And there was time for instruction, with two new students trying the sport for the first time and at least one old student honing his skills in anticipation of soloing. All in all, it was just a great day for flying, with a little competition thrown in for good measure.

Final Bomb Drop results were:

First place: Rich Lee with six points (37.5” from center).
Second place: Jim Feschak with five points (62.5” from center).
Third place: Tie between Jim Van Buren (132”) and David Vale (144”), each with four points.
Honorable mentions: Carl Gubkin and Bob Bennett, for both bombing the field twice.

Parachute Drop results were:

First place: Jans Brower with two clear misses and a disqualifying crash on the third attempt.
Dishonorable mention: Carl Gubkin, for losing his parachute in the corn on the first pass.