In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

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ZeroAltitude
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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby ZeroAltitude » Mon Jun 08, 2009 9:13 am

I have no words. I will miss Don and his invaluable input to our small internet aviation community.
Don leaves a gap that cannot be closed.
Michael Sagner
Solingen, Germany
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el
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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby el » Mon Jun 08, 2009 9:41 am

Don has always been a respected member on both the old as well as the new AirDisaster. He has been helpful and has always been be prepared to share his vast knowledge. We lost a true gentlemen. This small internet community will be a poorer one without his input.

My sincerest condolences to his family and friends.

Rest in Peace, my friend. We will miss you...

Eric Lothaller
Cape Town, South Africa

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby Carlos G. » Mon Jun 08, 2009 11:06 am

Don Moore was for several years a member of our aviation enthusiast's forum and he was always a most kind and friendly person, who shared with us his points-of-view, his opinions, his experience regarding aviation matters. He never lost his temper, he was a real friend, a person we all could rely on whatever the question was.

We will miss him in our internet aviation community especially because he was one of the proofs that it is indeed possible to make friends through the net.

Rest in Peace Don, wherever you are up there! And my deepest condolences to the family.

Carlos Gilbert
Porto, Portugal

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FrankM
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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby FrankM » Mon Jun 08, 2009 1:08 pm

Don, rest in peace and thanks you for everything. We will badly miss you. My deepest condolences to the family.

Frank Münker
Freiburg, Germany
Wir sind dann mal oben !

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby sindeewell » Mon Jun 08, 2009 1:41 pm

When I first joined AirDisaster.com, Don was one of the first people to make me feel welcome even though I had no aviation knowledge. He treated me with the same respect as others on the forum. He was kind, honest, fair, knowledgeable....and I will miss him.

My thoughts and prayers are with his family. God Bless you Don...you're flying with angels now!

CIndy Rhicard
Cowansville, Quebec, Canada
Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out and loudly proclaiming ~ WOW, what a ride~!!!

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Angelic One
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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby Angelic One » Mon Jun 08, 2009 2:22 pm

Rest in peace, Don. Your wisdom and your wit will be missed and we are all now less without you.


Paula Schuler
Virginia, USA
Always do whatever's next ~ George Carlin

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby AndyToop » Mon Jun 08, 2009 2:57 pm

Don,

Unshackled from the burden of this human form may your soul soar in the heavens that your heart never left.

My sincere condolences to your family & friends, you will be missed by so many.

Andy Toop
London, England

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby Pipe » Mon Jun 08, 2009 4:03 pm

I´ve cried behind my desk and feel no shame to admit it.

Sleep well, Don!

Heiko Flöther
Caxias do Sul - RS - Brazil
Res Severa Verum Gaudium

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Robert Hilton
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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby Robert Hilton » Mon Jun 08, 2009 4:55 pm

Clear skies Don.

Robert Hilton
The Netherlands.

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby rattler » Mon Jun 08, 2009 5:02 pm

I am - again - down to tears.

Hals- und Beinbruch!, Don!

Matthias Ohlmer (aka "Rattler"), Spain, Baleares
Sincere condolences to all Norwegians! I guess you will need some aquevit to get over this.

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby Verbal » Mon Jun 08, 2009 5:25 pm

We can take joy in the knowledge that Don is now freed from the horrible disease that wracked his body. Perhaps he is now exchanging aviation stories with other enthusiasts who have passed on. For the rest of us, the loss of his spirit, integrity and humor has left a void that no one can fill.

Kent von S.
Everett, Washington, USA
"I'm putting an end to this f*ckery." - Rayna Boyanov

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby KPryor » Mon Jun 08, 2009 5:27 pm

I only knew Don through emails, private messages and forum posts, but I considered him a friend. He was truly a gentleman and I respected him very much. Rest well, Don and thank you for your friendship!
Ken Pryor
Robinson, Illinois

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby busfan » Mon Jun 08, 2009 5:52 pm

RIP Don.

You will be missed.

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby 3WE » Mon Jun 08, 2009 5:53 pm

These internet relationships are strange. I never met Don and don’t know much about his family, yet, somehow is he was a friend and I share in the loss.

I would echo every comment above, and probably whatever is posted below.

What will stick with me is what I learned from Don- it was a lot!

He did a great job explaining things, and was always willing to share information.

Don’s love of aviation (as described by others) is another trait that sticks.

To Don’s family- thanks for sharing him with us, and we share in your loss.

To Don- Tell Orville and Wilbur hello for us, and go flying often!

Andy,
Missouri
Commercial Pilot, Vandelay Industries, Inc., Plant Nutrient Division.

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby flyboy2548m » Mon Jun 08, 2009 6:05 pm

These internet relationships are strange.
I agree. It's especially strange how different people who knew a person only from the internet can form drastically different impressions of said person. It's no secret that I never got along with Don, nor respected him a whole lot, but even I can't deny that he did seem to help many others and for that he will obviously be missed.

RIP Don.

Ike Chiladze

Morristown, NJ, USA
"Lav sinks on 737 Max are too small"

-TeeVee, one of America's finest legal minds.

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby Peminu » Mon Jun 08, 2009 6:14 pm

I will really miss this virtual friend, who was a real advisor and teacher.

My condolences to his family.

Pedro M.
México.
Just another cast away from AD.com that reached AD.info island.

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby Cam » Mon Jun 08, 2009 6:17 pm

Don...you have unlimited ceiling...punch it to take-off power and hold it there for eternity....

Cameron Craig
Halifax, NS Canada
Last edited by Cam on Mon Jun 08, 2009 6:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
You should all know by now....so please stop asking.

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3WE
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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby 3WE » Mon Jun 08, 2009 6:18 pm

I can see Don in this too.

http://www.flyingmag.com/classics/585/b ... olumn.html
By Gordon Baxter
October 2005

I have this wonderful recurring dream where I have died and gone to heaven. First heavenly thing is I notice I can fly. I just move my arms like a big bird, streamline my tail, and in a gentle climbing turn leave all the sounds of earthly grief far below. Along with it comes the warmth and light of understanding and knowing that someday they will all understand too.

Ahead are some low hills, adding climb power is effortless, better than an empty 172 into a cold wind. I crest the summit and gaze down into a green valley that somehow I always knew would look like that. It is a broad grassy pasture, there are Jennys and Stear-mans parked all over the place, some flying without going anywhere, like the biplanes of Bartlesville do. There are a few puffball cotton clouds, a gentle warm wind moving their shadow across this aerodrome. I turn on final, set up an approach to a small group of pilots wearing leather jackets, summer helmets and goggles gathered around some of the parked airplanes.

I touch down quietly, walk up to the group, being careful of my manners as the new boy should.

A tall slender guy, good looking, dimpled chin, sort of tousled hair, turns toward me, holds out his hand. It’s Charles Lindbergh. I would know him under a pear tree. He sort of laughs at the confusion on my face, says, “Hi Bax, see you made it. There were a few times back there when we would have bet either way.”

It’s the Lindbergh before fame made his life a hell on earth, the pilot Lindy, “Slim,” among the old airmail pilots and some awful looking DH-4s. I recognize his Jenny. The patches in the fabric, one wire wheel still sitting on the rim, tire missing, just like it looked the day he brought it in to Kelly Field and they made him move it off the airport. “That's your Jenny” I risk. “Oh sure, but I just like to keep it close to me. The airplane I fly here is that one over there.” I look in the direction of his gesture, see a small biplane I had missed. It is an S.E.-5A, Army colors, yellow wings, dark fuselage. “I got the feeling from your books how much you liked that little pursuit ship.”

“Yup,” said my hero, “you didn’t think they would issue me that heavy-wing Monocoupe did you? This is heaven.” He paused, the bright light of the author came into his eyes. “You read my book?” he asked softly. I told him I had read it at least twice. Lindbergh moved a half step closer, lowered his voice, “Which one?” I was thinking how heavenly authors act just like authors even up here. “All of them,” I honestly told him.

“Really?” Lindbergh reached out, touched my arm. “Which one twice?” I told him his classic Spirit of St. Louis I had read three times, got something different out of it each time. And I had read his Wartime Journals twice, started keeping my own journal as a result. Lindbergh laughed, looked around, “Come on, you need to get checked out in a Jenny, I understand you are already an experienced Stearman pilot.”

“If by experienced you mean a few excursions out into the high grass and some dragged wing tips, I sure was an experienced Stearman pilot all right.” He laughed softly, and as we walked toward a Jenny, all bright in 1918 army colors, he put his arm over my shoulder. I like to have died. Then had to stop and laugh at myself. I’d already done that.

The cowling was off the Jenny, laying there in the soft grass. A fierce-looking fellow, dark mustache, dark deep-set eyes and wearing a golfer’s cap on backwards was hunkered down in front of the Jenny with a lot of plumbing parts scattered around him and his tool box open. “Bax, this is Glenn Curtiss. Mr. Curtiss, Bax here used to write for Flying magazine.” Curtiss glanced my way, “Yeah, I read his stuff. And thanks, Bax, for naming that little girl after my Jenny.” I just gulped and stared.

Curtiss’ big, square-knuckled hands were back at work on hoses and clamps. Halfway to himself he muttered “I’m gonna get this thing right this time. After all, this is heaven, ain’t it? I always believed I should have made this OX-5 air cooled, but I let ‘em talk me out of it.” Curtiss shook his head in regret. Then seeing the brighter side, as folks in heaven always do, he said, “But isn’t that a good-looking engine? We all stopped and stared at the broad 90-degree vee of the engine, and its open air overhead valve system. “You know the army bought my V-8s from 1912 to 1927, then I brought out that beautiful D-12. Hadn’t been for Charles Lawrence and that dizzy ring around of cylinders he made for Wright and called the J-5 Whirlwind I’d had it made.”

“Don’t knock that J-5,” Lindberg said with mock severity. Curtiss looked up and grinned at him, “Oh yeah, that thing kept you dry all the way to Paris didn’t it.” Both men laughed. Curtiss directed his intense gaze to me, “You don’t have to worry about the single ignition on this engine up here. The Boss is in charge of all things of light, which includes electricity. It’s only this plumbing you still have to worry about.”

Being only in my first day in heaven I had to ask why God didn’t make the plumbing perfect too? “Oh, plumbing is of the devil. Always has been. The spirits of dark run through pipes. Plumbing is only a system to contain treachery. Nothing we can do about it here long as Satan still has so many buddies down there on earth.” I pondered this.

Looking for the lighter side I said to Mr. Curtiss, “Well, not many people know you first put your engines on a motorcycle and were called the ‘Fastest Man on Earth.’ And personally I think your invention of the aileron, the third axis of control, is the most important thing you ever gave us.”

Curtiss looked up at Lindy, “See there? Some of them do know. Here, you want to check this guy out, let me get it all back together for you.” Curtiss stood up, spread his grease-stained hands and powerful arms like Moses, and in an instant the OX-5 engine assembled itself, cowling snapping into place last. Curtiss stood back, said “Now that’s heaven. Putting a job back together is always the worst part.” I thought of Dick Bach. He had already claimed the angels could do this kind of work back on earth and sold a million books to goofy teenage girls for it. “Get in. I’ll prop her for you.” And Lindbergh nodded toward the rear cockpit.

Now I always get the hoo-hahs, the fan-todds, the gleeks and the check ride twitters, but this time I just settled down in that Jenny knowing it was all going to be okay. Nothing had changed, it was just a matter of where I was coming from now. “Off!” called Curtiss, pulling the big S-carved wooden prop through a blade or two after Lindbergh called “off” back to him.

“Contact,” said Glenn Curtiss. “Contact,” said Charles Lindbergh, and I saw the switch move on the panel.

Curtiss took a deep breath, heaved down on the riveted brass edge of that propeller blade, using the momentum of his effort to turn, duck and run away from the front of the Jenny which had barked to life and was now running smoothly. What did you expect? This is heaven you know.

Lindy raised both hands in the air for me to see. The Jenny, having no brakes but only a tail skid in the turf, was trembling forward. I peered around the cowling and the knicker-knacking rocker arms, advanced the throttle and light as a goose feather we ran briefly and ascended into the sky. Thrilled to the core I said out of habit, “O Lordy.” And a deep voice right beside me said “Yes?” This place is going to take some getting used to.

The Jenny flew like a wicker basket of marshmallows riding a feather mattress. I grinned till my teeth kept drying out, did a few tentative wire whistling steep turns. Lindbergh patted the top of his helmet, I shook the stick, he took it. Oh how he made that Jenny sing. An elephantine loop, a frozen motion hammerhead stall, even an Immelman turn, the engine spraying us with a baptism of rusty water at being upside down and not liking it much. My hero turned, grinning at me, held up both his hands again, I took it. I was expecting to be airsick as usual, but my belly was nothing but laughter. Heaven indeed! And you know I got a brush-the-grass three pointer landing first try, now elevated from my ham-handed earthly self.

Parked at the flight line I saw what was unmistakably a 1918 SPAD pursuit ship down at the end and a fellow in jodhpurs and puttees leaning against the cockpit. “That Rickenbacker?” I whispered. Lindbergh nodded. “You can visit him tomorrow. We know he is your other hero, but you’ve had enough for one day. After you check out in SPADs he’ll invite you to fly a dawn patrol with his pursuit squadron.”

“What if I get shot down?”

“Oh you will, the green guys always do, but getting shot down here is like on TV. You just get up and come back the next day.” Lindbergh stood there a minute, enjoying my wonder.

Then said, “You can have a Stearman or a Jenny here, whichever you’d like. Or one of each if you wish. This is heaven.”

I stood looking toward the Stearmans, was surprised to recognize one I had last seen flying at Bartlesville. It was the softly gleaming deep plum-colored, fully cowled and wheel panted 450 P&W Amazing Grace that I knew belonged to Mike Danforth. “Has anything happened to Mike?” I wasn’t sure how to ask about such things up here. “Oh no,” chuckled Lindy, “That’s God’s Stearman. He liked it so much he had a copy made for Himself.”

So God flies a 450 Stearman. Didn’t really surprise me very much, and from that moment on I knew I had found my heavenly home.
Commercial Pilot, Vandelay Industries, Inc., Plant Nutrient Division.

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Schorsch
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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby Schorsch » Mon Jun 08, 2009 8:09 pm

Very sad and very sudden.
His postings and expressed opinions were always a great addition and his general attitude showed the wisdom of age.

Regards,
Jörg Fuchte
Hamburg, Germany.
Publicly, we say one thing... Actually, we do another.

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby ZilogMan » Mon Jun 08, 2009 9:18 pm

What can I say...? Reading all these posts brought tears to my eyes. He was a very knowledged man, reading a post from him was always a treat and he will be missed a lot for that. Sincere condolences to his family and pals.

Yvan "Lionel" Mercier
Quebec City, QC, Canada.
Don, Say Hi to Amelia Earhart for us...

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby Jorge » Mon Jun 08, 2009 9:24 pm

Don,

you will be missed. My heart and prayers go out to the Moore Family durring this difficult time.

Jorge
San Jose, California
La Vida Es Un Carnival- Celia Cruz

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby sully » Mon Jun 08, 2009 9:52 pm

It is a measure of a person that those not fortunate enough to have met him , will miss him and feel loss. I was never lucky enough to have met Don though I can only imagine him as the kind gentleman that his internet persona portrayed.

Rest in Peace Don , and for the last time , Thanks for all those answers.

Sully
Luxembourg

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby GlennAB1 » Mon Jun 08, 2009 10:05 pm

My heart goes out to Don's loved ones, may they somehow find
comfort by knowing he no longer suffers from the cruelty of ALS.

Don was a wealth of knowledge whom I'll always remember.
I wish I'd met him in person.

Rest in peace, Don.

Glenn
Indianapolis, IN
you still have to find a crew willing to fly this "barely airworthy" heap
no such thing as "barely airworthy" it's either Airworthy or Not
100% incorrect Ever hear of Ferry Permit? issued for Non airworthy aircraft
LOL

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby GerryW » Mon Jun 08, 2009 10:11 pm

I am sitting here on my computer, searching for words... I surfed AD.info the whole evening and didn't see these threads. I only noticed the black ribbon on our logo and wanted to ask in the Off Topic section what it would mean, if it would be for mourning the Air France losses...

Then a 1000000 Volt hit me when I noticed the thread Charles (ITS) started.

Don brought me a lot of Inside Knowledge one can never find in aviation books. And I thought he would recover quickly so that he could participate in the AF speculations. But it didn't meant to be that way.

As many here already mentioned, Don will be missed, and my thoughts are going to his family which misses him much more.

Our sincere condolences

The Wirth family
Luxembourg

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Re: In memoriam Don Moore - condolence book

Postby orangehuggy » Mon Jun 08, 2009 10:18 pm

Sad news. It has been a pleasure to read the contributions throughout the years. Rest in peace Sir.
Igor
Colorado


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