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One of my more off-beat stories

Rmack

Van Allen Belt Sunbather
Hi,

This is about some time that I spent on the "Diana" which used to be the "Mission Into Time" vessel "Enchantress" I think it was called. It was an 80' (or so) steel hulled motor-sailer. There was a model of it in the Flag lobby when I was there in '79-'80.

I was at flag after leaving the Sea Org. I still did not know about OT3 or any of the upper level stuff, and still thought that going up the bridge would help me achieve my main goal of being able to "exteriorize" at will.

I had been contacted by a young women from flag with the offer of paying off my "freeloaders debt" to ASHO at the rate of $10 an hour by doing renovation work. I was promised high quality room and board and $35 a week "engineer" pay, and no more than a 40 hour work week. All of this was reneged on at some point in the six months I was there. Even the paying of the debt was apparently not going to happen, according to someone from ASHO who contacted me, saying that Flag had no authority to promise that. Typical Sea Org horse shit.

Anyway, I was lifting weights in a corner of the parking structure that had a workout area when I was approached by this old estates guy who had an office in said structure nearby. He asked me if I had any sailing experience. I said very little in small dinghies in the Oceanside CA harbor. Good enough, he said, and soon I was flying to North Carolina to catch a bus to Beaufort, NC where I was to rendezvous with an Australian public who had bought the boat and was sailing it to Clearwater to do NOTS

I got off the bus in Beaufort, to find that there were no motels or anything. And no Diana at the waterfront docks. I approached a Police officer in a 7-11 type store and told him my predicament. He gracefully offered to drive me to a town a few miles away that did have a motel. Not much chance of that kind of assistance from a cop nowadays, huh?

Turns out this guy and his partner were sky divers, and being a hang glider pilot, I was a fellow "air junkie". We hit it off, and they offered to take me on a jump in a few days.

On the way to the motel, they get a radio call about a man with a gun back in Beaufort. This seems bizarre, but I shit you not, I found myself in a 100 mile and hour drive back to Beaufort with the cops actually telling me that if shooting starts, I could have the shotgun.

Now, I wouldn't blame you if you find this hard to believe, but I swear to God, that's what they said. They were very young adrenaline junkies and I think I stumbled upon the most exciting call they had had in a long time. Luckily, when they got to the scene, no one was around and all was quiet, so back we went to the other town to the south to drop me off at a motel. That was when they offered me the sky-dive, I believe. We were bonded at that point.

It got weirder after that!

The next day I took a taxi back to Beaufort. I was walking with my duffel bag when I see the Diana sailing down a channel towards the harbor. I recognized it from the model back at the Flag lobby. I thought they were headed out to sea, so I'm running, waving like a maniac trying to get their attention.

They pulled into the waterfront docking, however, and I reported aboard.

The story was that two other Sea Org members had quit after going through a killer hurricane where the boat had it's steering smashed and had to get towed back by the Coast Guard. They said it took hours just to get a line from them for the tow.

After being on board for a few days, I started to think there might have been other reasons.

As I mentioned in one of my other stories, The most "SP" type people I have ever met where higher level OT's. This Australian turned out to be a vicious bully. I never endured so much "razzing" and invalidation in my life!

We were in port for a few days undergoing repairs and resupply. It seemed like I was a great asset to the crew. I was told to read a book on Ocean survival and put together a large ice chest full of supplies to survive losing the boat at sea to supplement the life raft with scant supplies that he already had on board. When he found out I was a certified diver, he had me rent diving gear and clean barnacles from the hull. None of this spared me the mental haranguing.

This was purportedly the boat that Hubbard did the original OT3 "research" on. I don't know if that has anything to do with it, but that boat was a living hell sometimes.

I also had some great times. Drinking way too much beer in a dock side bar over 300 years old, listening to a bagpipe player and such. Although I had been told by the estates guy that I would be getting "wog wages", the Australian had the idea that SO members worked for room and board, and got no pay, so I supplemented my dwindling funds by helping other boat owners with small projects. I was swinging back and forth a good 50-60 or more feet from a bosun's seat at the top a mast installing a radar one time.

I never did meet up with the cops for skydiving. I showed up outside a restaurant they said to meet them at, but I was a couple of minutes late and didn't see them, if they had been there.

When we finally got underway to Charleston, we all had two four hour watches a day in groups of two and I didn't interact with the crazy owner as much. I became the default cook, frying up fresh caught fish for everyone and what not.

When we came into Charleston, the old alcoholic captain the guy had hired broke the drive shaft shifting into reverse trying to get that heavy pig docked. He became the target of the owners vitriolic tirades for a while.

We where there for over a week getting a new drive shaft made and installed. When we left Charleston, something was wrong. the variable pitch prop was not doing what it was suppose to at different settings. We went back to port and I was sent over the side in more rental diving gear to inspect the prop.

I have nearly a hundred hours in Cessnas and even a few in a Beechcraft Mentor that has a constant speed prop, so I know what I'm talking about. I insisted that the prop was not at the proper angle of attack. At high pitch, it was actually at a negative angle of attack, and at what should have been a low pitch-sort of a low gear setting-it was at a huge almost flat to the water angle. I was invalidated, but I held my ground.

Finally, the owner decided to dismiss everyone, and he gave me a bus ticket back. I had to argue with him for a few bucks for food for the three day journey. Realize that this guy was a millionaire!

Back at Flag, this guy approached me a few days later and said that I was right about the prop and offered me a position on the crew for a treasure hunting trip. This was the second time I'd heard about people trying to duplicate what they thought Hubbard had done, and recover sunken treasure located by past live memory.

Well, there was no way in hell that I was EVER getting on board a boat-basically a set of rooms you can't leave-with this asshole again, so I declined.

If you read Bent Corydon's book (I saw Bent at Flag at the time trying to get his mission back, or something) "LRH Madman or Messiah", somewhere in the final chapters it mentions a guy drowning while diving for a rich Australian on a treasure hunting expedition.

There but for the grace of God go I!
 
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Boldgirl

Patron Meritorious
Heh. Thanks.

Scientology hates history

Zinj


Zinj

Is it true you knew hubbard and worked with him? I thought I read that on another thread from someone...
if so are there old threads where you told your stories? if yes, can you bump them to present time?
 

programmer_guy

True Ex-Scientologist
Rmack said:
When he found out I was a certified diver, ...

Just outta curiosity (off topic), what was your certification level? Open water I? Advanced? Rescue? Dive Master?

Anyway, I can just imagine the "fun" in removing barnacles on a yacht hull in low visibility. (BTW, what was the visibility when you did that?)
 

SchwimmelPuckel

Genuine Meatball
The Scientology books and lectures I own have never mentioned, or even hinted at, a hatred of history. :confused2:
No need to be confused.. You know the condition formulas don't you?

The intire Hubbard PR tech is there to 'rewrite history' and present a 'shore story'. It's part of a marketing effort to reel in the marks who then thinks all is a rose garden.. But of course you're right that it's not stated plainly anywhere. It would defeat the purpose if it was..

Ponder it a bit and you'll get it.

:yes:
 

Div6

Crusader
Zinj

Is it true you knew hubbard and worked with him? I thought I read that on another thread from someone...
if so are there old threads where you told your stories? if yes, can you bump them to present time?

Zinj has never "done" any scn, either auditing or training. He has been fairgamed though. Both DartSmohen and Alan worked with LRH in the 60's. Search for those, and you will get some interesting tales.
 

Rmack

Van Allen Belt Sunbather
Just outta curiosity (off topic), what was your certification level? Open water I? Advanced? Rescue? Dive Master?

Anyway, I can just imagine the "fun" in removing barnacles on a yacht hull in low visibility. (BTW, what was the visibility when you did that?)

I was certified under the now defunct "National Association of Skin Diving Schools" in San Diego in 1968. I had taken several "Senior Diver" classes also, including open water rescue, underwater navigation, night diving, heavy surf diving, and deep diving with decompression.

It's been awhile, but I recall that the visibility wasn't that bad. 20-30 feet maybe. Heck, doing a menial job is more fun when your diving.
 

Rmack

Van Allen Belt Sunbather
Rmack, why don't you go make a tandem jump? r.

I had taken sky diving lessons and had done a static line jump with an old military green conical canopy when those cops invited me.

I just was so into hang gliding that it never was something I wanted to do. Well, a free-fall sounds fun, but very expensive to get to that point. I might do it some day.

Btw, your reading one of the few hang glider pilots in the world who has the dubious distinction of having made two emergency parachute deployments. Interesting stories, but sort of off-topic.
 

Rmack

Van Allen Belt Sunbather
The Oz that bought the Diana sounds like Harry Mason.....

It's been a LONG time, but that name sort of rings a bell.

BTW, I researched the time frame a little and it had to have been more like the fall-winter of '82-'83 that I was on board with that guy. What more do you know about him? Apart from being Australian, he said he was a geologist that specialized in finding gold and other valuable resources.
 
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rich

Silver Meritorious Patron
I had taken sky diving lessons and had done a static line jump with an old military green conical canopy when those cops invited me.

I just was so into hang gliding that it never was something I wanted to do. Well, a free-fall sounds fun, but very expensive to get to that point. I might do it some day.

Btw, your reading one of the few hang glider pilots in the world who has the dubious distinction of having made two emergency parachute deployments. Interesting stories, but sort of off-topic.

Glad you made it. Those emergencies get monotonous after awhile don't they? ;)
You could do a tandem freefall or a windtunnel ride. Cheap. Viewing is usually free.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=V-47STX3RBA
 

rich

Silver Meritorious Patron
I don't think they made any green conicals. I think they were white. Not sure.
 

Rmack

Van Allen Belt Sunbather
I don't think they made any green conicals. I think they were white. Not sure.

Um, yes they did. I jumped one by static line about June 1973 in Lake Elsinore, at the sky diving center before the first flood. It was green. I was told it was military surplus. It was probably designed to be hidden by a bailing out pilot.
 

Dulloldfart

Squirrel Extraordinaire
http://skyventure.com/tunnellocations/

They got one of those vertical wind tunnels at Universal Citywalk in North Hollywood. One near London. Others elsewhere. I'd go if I still lived in LA. Looks like lots of fun and more confrontable than real skydiving. $40 for a newbie including all the gear, instruction etc. Takes about an hour total. Flight time one minute. Info from their website.

Paul
 

rich

Silver Meritorious Patron
http://skyventure.com/tunnellocations/

They got one of those vertical wind tunnels at Universal Citywalk in North Hollywood. One near London. Others elsewhere. I'd go if I still lived in LA. Looks like lots of fun and more confrontable than real skydiving. $40 for a newbie including all the gear, instruction etc. Takes about an hour total. Flight time one minute. Info from their website.

Paul
Then you wouldn't be so dull.
They are all over the world if you search "vertical wind tunnel " or something like that. r.
 
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