Reprinted from the Spokane Chronicle, July 26, 1990
As a youngster growing up on Spokane's South Hill, John Walters dreamed of becoming an unlimited hydroplane driver like legends of the sport such as Bill Muncey, Rex Manchester, Billy Schumacher, and Mira Slovak.
Unlike many of his Lincoln Heights Elementary classmates Walters was perhaps one of the few that was eventually able to realize his true childhood dream.
Rocketed - almost literally - on to the unlimited racing scene 10 years ago this weekend, Walters took one of the most talked about, famous, and harrowing rides in unlimited hydroplane racing history - and lived to tell about it.
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| John Walters in 1980. |
Walters was at the helm of the turbine-powered Pay 'N Pak during a race day test run on the Columbia River course. Moments after passing the start-finish line, the boat unexpectedly launched itself into the warm spring morning sky. Then, after almost three full flips, and what seemed like an eternity, the white and orange boat slammed into the cold dark water.
And that's how John Walters first made a name for himself in hydroplane racing. He'd later gain the type of notoriety he long for, plus a spot in the sport's history books, by being the first driver to win a race in a turbine-powered boat at Syracuse in 1982. But a few weeks later in Seattle, Walters' driving career - and nearly his life - would come to an end in a three-boat accident that should have never happened.
With all that behind him, Walters returns once again to Tri-Cities for this weekend's Columbia Cup. This time his feet are firmly planted on the ground as a crew member of the Mr. Pringles Hydro. "They call me the hull specialist," Walters says of his job. "It's basically (being) in charge of the maintenance that goes on with the boat."
Walters has been long removed from the cockpit - by doctor's orders - but is still a vital player in the sport of his dreams. And memories of 10 years ago are a clear as the day they happened.
"I remember everything about that one," Walters said. "I still occasionally wake up in the middle of the night, upside down and backwards at 170 mph wondering where that blue bridge went."
His boat "was really working well," in fact, maybe too well, Walters recalls of that July 26th morning. "The boat would accelerate so quickly that you could get going real fast, even quicker than you realize."
Since Walters had had little time in the boat, he was trying to see how quick it took to from the exit buoy to the starting line. Unlimited hydros race both themselves and a clock at the start of a race, so refining starting line strategy is very important.
A few minutes before the test run, the rescue boats cut across the course to take up their posts and left behind a small wake. Walters said, "I felt the boat rattle over the wake a little bit and it picked up the nose and kind of hung there for a long time." There wasn't any feeling of panic, however, and it actually felt like the boat was settling back down.
A second or so later "it felt like someone kicked a jackstand out from under the rear of the boat and dropped the back end of the boat real hard, "Walters said.
What was unknown at the time, but later revealed in videotape, was the fact that the horizontal stabilizer has begun to fail, kinking in the center as the boat sped down the back straightaway. Instead of keeping the boat's read end riding at the right angle, it allowed the stern to suddenly drop.
"The back end did indeed drop, which let the front end get a little higher." Walters said. "It just continued to rotate and took off like an airplane."
"You know I was awake, conscious, alert and knowing what was going on and knew the thing had gone over backwards," Walters recalls. "Then I saw the water and the bridge come back around and realized, shoot, I'm a long ways in the air."
The boat, which measured just under 30 feet, did nearly three revolutions so it reached an estimated 75 feed in the air. "The last thing I remember (before impact) was that the boat was upside down. It seemed like it was going to take forever for the thing to actually hit the water."
He started to think "Geez, maybe this is the end."
Walters rode with the boat until the tip of the right sponson hit the water and threw him clear. "I couldn't have gotten out if I wanted to," Walters said. "Because of the direction of rotation there's a positive G-force that wants to crush you into the seat.
"Boom, and it hit and the next thing I remember was feeling like I was frozen," Walters said. Coming from the cockpit at 130 degrees to the cold Columbia at 70 degrees would tend to do that.
After hitting the water, Walters called on his experience as a limited hydro driver and began to "check around and make sure I had all the parts and everything was still functional and moving."
The tally of Walters' body damage came to a broken hip, broken ribs and a shoulder separation, and "a severely bruised ego."
"Frankly, because of my accident, because of Steve Reynolds' accident and Jimmy Kropfeld's accident, the boats are as good as they are today," Walters said. Radical changes to hydroplane design, like the mandatory enclosed cockpit, have saved perhaps a half dozen or more lives in the last few years.
"The way boats are designed today I would have come back a little wet, frustrated and fine other than that," Walters said.