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A little bit of Tom back in the air.

Lee

 

 
Yes that's a double keel. Tom Manship. When I herd that he went in I put in a bid on his old rig. I was afraid some young twit of a jumper would throw it out not knowing what it was. The family was kind enough to intrust it to me. It's one of the few double keels that I know the location of. Nice canopy. I was trying to explain to his sister what it looked like. She found a pic of a single. You might refrence her to this pic. I don't think she's ever seen it.

Lee

Nice.
I was thinkin' of him this morning.

Fly on, Tom.

Very cool
Thanks for sharing that.
He flies with me on every jump, and always will. RIP brother.
Later
Blair

is the pic of tom flying the double keel or is it you?

...i think of him often myself.

How about a Tom tale:

So its a weekday, Tom's in Carolina for the holiday, we'd been jumping a few short ones by his house and ours prior too tonight. We get to our loca A (thanks 515) and low an behold they left the vader on. Normally we climb to 325' for a fatass 2 second delay, but tonight we brought an extra slider up rig just in case. The exit point has intermidate cloud cover with a decent wind pushing away, and ideal conditions for icing. So after clearing the ice from the exit point, 515 launches from about 1200' and does the textbook 515 puuurfect jump. Tom's last off, he liked the attention. 704 and I already stashed watching as Tom's track kicks in for a second, reach, pitch...We both say something like..." o shit man, he's gonna land on that ""BANG"" building... d'oh! Literally he had enough time to get a nice flare in for a relatively soft landing on top of the ONLY outbuilding that was about 10'X20X on the roof, dead center on the apex. He WAS accurate right Rod!!
He was OK, and immediately 704 and 515 were over the compound to the work truk parked inside, with a nice big ladder strapped on the side. Got Tom the ladder, and he climbed down after stashing his gear. 2 Nice size prints from the HanWags was all that was left. So if you ever saw his Avatar with the game in the pic, that's why. We played a little Chutes and Laddars that night. Good stuff. I have a large word doc with most of my 'tom stories' on them, I used to cry trying to add to it, now I laugh everytime I read it, and remember more about how THANKFUL I am to have known the Perrine Troll.
Later
Blair
Tom I miss you bro!

 
It's Me. I jumped the rig the following weekend affter I picked it up from the family. I thought she might like to see what it looked like.
I beleave rigs like airplanes are ment to fly. It's there purpouse, there meaning. At times I wonder what stories an old plane or rig might tell of all the places it has been or things it's done. All the people it has tought to fly over the years. I hope the rest of his gear also finds it's way into other hands. Perhaps a young student. I hope they will apreceate the history that comes with it. Perhaps it will pass on some of those experences as it whispers to him at the exit point. I remember his first A. How tired he was climbing. How scared he was climbing over the railing. How he closed his eyes and his breathing slowed. He opened them and all the fear was gone. It was almost like he was in a trance. Peacefull. I remember how serine he looked as he stared out at the sun just cracking over the horizon. Then he launched with out saying a word.
I'm sorry. It's very late at night. I can't sleep and I'm waxing metaphysical with out a spellchecker. I should know better.
As his gear get's passed on it might be interesting the get a picture of the new owners jumping it.

Lee
Lee

u kick ass lee thank u for keeping a legend alive.
by the way how big is that canopy, and how does it land

It's huge. The double keel is a real big boy canopy. The single is... I don't recall the number. It was like 250 sqft. The double is over three hundred. Doesn't really flare. Lands soft as a feather just becouse has such a low sink rate. Turns surprisingly well. Opening on the double was nice.


Lee

Some of it did.. I got his Fox 285....and i do appreciate the history... "I hope it doesn't wisper to loud as i will have enough things to think about at exit point"... I will post pictures...

I was looking through old pm's and found this... It's the last message Tom wrote to me.

it's so profound looking at it now.

Hey Lee!

That is an awesome shot! The canopy is very colorful for it?s day. Tom obviously had excellent taste in equipment. Without question, you are the man that should be flying it today. It is living history.

Would you consider doing a historic rig, demo jump in CO this summer?

Blue Skies!
Baz

I got his Rock Dragon and took it to the top of our 600' other this weekend only to climb back down. Damn weather.

The conditions were right to do a local B tonight but my jumping buddy elected to have dinner with his girl. WTF.