By Mark McKenna
Reprinted from the Tri-City Herald, July 24, 2004.
John Walters will be as inconspicuous as an unlimited hydroplane crew member can be this weekend in Lampson Pits.
He’ll spend much of his time on the deck of the U-8 Llumar Window Film with his head buried in the boat’s turbine, trying to squeeze as much speed out of the engine as possible.
But inevitably, some hard-core hydro fan will recognize him in his mechanic’s suit and spring the question: Hey, aren’t you the guy who ...?
“Yeah, that’s me,” Walters will answer. “I’m the guy who drove the Pak.”
Walters won only one race aboard the famous Pay ’n Pak turbine, but it was his qualifying run right here in the Tri-Cities that made him sort of an icon in the sport.
On July 27, 1980, Walters, then a 27-year-old unlimited rookie driver from Renton, took the Pak on a mid-morning test run in preparation for its first-ever race.
As the sleek boat took the corner and cruised toward the start clock at about 170 mph, its nose suddenly rose into the air. Walters fought the boat to no avail, and sat helplessly as it took off into a spectacular end-over-end flip. After 21⁄2 times around, the boat slammed into the water and shattered across the river.
“I remember thinking, ‘I can save this,’” Walters said. “But then the boat kept climbing and climbing. It was like someone kicked out a jack from underneath me. Then I saw the blue bridge disappear, then I saw the horizon and then the boat’s shadow on the river. Just like my famous quote — sky water, sky water. It seemed like the it took forever.
“I don’t remember hitting the water or coming out of the boat,” Walters continued. “But I do remember the water was cold, and I knew that I was supposed to raise my hands above my head if I was OK. When I did that, I remember a huge roar from the fans. I was hurting, but that made me feel great.” Walters dislocated his hip and shoulder and also suffered several cuts and bruises, but he considers himself lucky.
“When I saw tape of the flip, I realized it could have been much worse,” Walters said. “I still had all my arms and legs.”
It was soon determined that accident was caused by a faulty horizontal wing, which was damaged the previous day during a trailer fire.
The flip didn’t scare Walters out of the driver’s seat. In fact, he said from his hospital bed that he would resume racing.
Two years later, Walters finally brought the Pak home a winner as he outdueled Budweiser’s Dean Chenoweth in the final heat in Romulus, N.Y.
Walters’ good fortune didn’t last long, however. Later in the 1982 season, he was involved in a collision with the Squire Shop, driven by Tom D’Eath, and George Johnson’s Executone at the Emerald Cup in Seattle that forced him to leave the sport for good.
Walters suffered multiple fractures and head injuries, and doctors told his wife, Arlene, that the outlook was grim.
“Doctors said I would probably lose the sight in my left eye, that they might have to amputate my right arm below the elbow and that I might lose my left leg. It was pretty bleak.”
Walters recovered much better than expected, thanks to 14 months in Harborview Medical Center and 11 surgeries. Still, he lives with constant pain.
“I hurt every day,” Walters said. “I still have problems with my hip and back. But I’m active, and sometimes I even overdo it, usually when I’m running and jumping around with my grandkids.”
After the Seattle crash, Walters continued to stay close to the sport. He worked on Fran Muncey’s Miller American, Bill Wurster’s Mr. Pringles, and he was the crew chief for Bob Fendler and Jerry Rise’s Appian Jeronimo in the mid-1990s before reuniting with Wurster on the U-8 team.
Walters, 51, who now lives in Issaquah, juggles hydroplane racing with his full-time position at Three Five Systems, Inc., an electronic manufacturing company in Redmond.
“I’ve got a great situation. I have a good job and I still get to tinker with hydroplanes,” Walters said. And despite that ominous summer day in 1980, Walters enjoys coming back to the Columbia Cup.
“The Tri-Cities is a wonderful place to race,” he said. “The course is fast and the race committee is so committed to putting on a great race. And the fans really know the sport.”
Which is why Walters expects to hear from several fans who want to talk about THE FLIP.
“It’s amazing the number of people who I run across that say, ‘Geez, I was there on the beach when you flipped the Pak,’” Walters said. “But I don’t mind. There were a lot of people who shared the experience that day, and it’s kind of fun to talk about.”