Word: ripcords
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...groggily about 10 ft. It wobbled sideways across the airdrome, but not an inch higher would it go. The ground crew dragged the bag back; part of the heavy apparatus was unloaded. Still no luck. After two hours of struggle, Air Com-mander Garankidze wearily ordered: "De- flate." The ripcord was yanked and the silvery bag billowed to earth. C. A German racing balloon, blown by a stiff wind clear out of Germany and across the North Sea, landed on the English coast. Its crew of three suffered first a ducking, then the embarrassment of being arrested for trespassing...
...plane three miles high he would plummet down, trailing flour like a comet's tail, until within 1,000 ft. of the ground, then jerk his 'chute open. His most famed jump occurred a year ago in California when he fell 16,000 ft., jerked his ripcord at 500 ft., landed in an orange tree. An English jumper beat that record for altitude (he dropped 17,250 ft.) but pulled his ripcord at 3,750 ft. No one had dropped so far and so close to earth as Spud Manning...
...Quincy Railroad yards at 14th & Canal Streets. Plunk!-it landed on the tracks, barely missing the head of a yardman and scaring him out of his wits. In a few minutes a crowd of thousands jammed the yards. "Get those cigarets away!" shouted Commander Settle, who had pulled the ripcord to empty the bag of hydrogen. Except for a dent in the gondola the balloon and instruments were intact. Sadly Commander Settle explained the fiasco: planning to hang at 5,000 ft. until dawn, he had pulled his gas escape valve. The valve stuck open. Then it was recalled that...
...Angeles, Parachute Jumper E. S. ("Spud") Manning challenged Jumper Harold ("Bud") Brandon to a contest to see who could drop nearer the earth before opening his chute. Plummeting from the sky, Jumper Brandon pulled his ripcord at 100 ft. altitude, won the match, was dashed to death upon the ground...
...half-dozen Marine planes came screaming down upon the field in a formation dive. All pulled out of it except one. piloted by Lieut. Glenn M. Britt, which continued to shoot earthward at 300 m.p.h. About 250 ft. above the ground Lieut. Britt jumped clear, pulled his ripcord. His 'chute barely billowed open before he struck the ground, just after his plane crashed in front of the grandstand. Lieut. Britt picked himself up, hurried to a microphone, greeted the crowd: "Hello, everybody! I'm not hurt, thank...