'Chute Etiquet

Cinemagoers who saw Air Mail recall the furtive pilot who early in his career, had 'chuted from a floundering transport, leaving his passengers to die. At Long Beach, Calif, last week the reverse of that incredible episode was enacted. Lieut. Parker Abbott, U.S.N.R., nearly lost his own life while trying to make his terrified passenger jump from a spinning Navy plane. The passenger, another reservist named Floyd Vivian Schultz, sat motionless, paralyzed by fear. Lieut. Abbott tried in vain to push him out, finally had to jump, leave Schultz to crash with the plane.

Oldtime airmen can recall no factual basis for the episode referred to in Air Mail, an episode which air transport men regard as libelous. Nearest historical approach to the legend is the case of the late "Al" Wilson, Hollywood stunt pilot, who jumped from a spinning Sikorsky bomber, leaving in the ship a man who was manipulating smokepots for a cinema shot. The passenger also wore a 'chute but made no apparent move to jump. The Professional Pilots' Association investigated, concluded that Pilot Wilson had jumped without warning, drummed him out of its ranks. Last September at the National Air Races in Cleveland. Pilot Wilson died of injuries from a collision of his oldtime Curtiss "pusher" with an Autogiro (TIME, Sept. 12).

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